man > update-fonts-alias(8)

update-fonts-alias(8)                  System Manager's Manual                 update-fonts-alias(8)

NAME
       update-fonts-alias - compile fonts.alias files

SYNOPSIS
       update-fonts-alias [OPTION] directory ...

DESCRIPTION
       update-fonts-alias  assembles  a  fonts.alias  file  in an X font directory using one or more
       alias files found in a subdirectory of /etc/X11/fonts/.  It is typically  invoked  only  from
       the  post-installation and post-removal scripts of a package containing X Window System fonts
       that provide aliases for their XLFD names, but may be invoked  at  any  time  to  reconstruct
       fonts.alias  files.  For each directory, which is simply the last component of its path (such
       as ‘75dpi’ or ‘misc’),  update-fonts-alias  will  assemble  either  /usr/lib/X11/fonts/direc‐
       tory/fonts.alias  or  /usr/share/fonts/X11/directory/fonts.alias  from  the  files  found  in
       /etc/X11/fonts/directory/package.alias.

       This enables multiple packages to provide aliases for fonts in the same directory.   No  font
       package actually provides the fonts.alias file in the X font directory itself, so there is no
       danger of overwriting one package's aliases with those of another.

       For  instance,  the  two packages ‘xfonts-base’ and ‘xfonts-base-transcoded’ may both install
       fonts into the directory /usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc.  They each place their fonts.alias files in
       /etc/X11/fonts/misc/xfonts-base.alias  and   /etc/X11/fonts/misc/xfonts-base-transcoded.alias
       (respectively).   update-fonts-alias concatenates these two files (as well as any others that
       match /etc/X11/fonts/misc/*.alias) into /usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc/fonts.alias.

       The format of fonts.alias files is described in the mkfontdir(1x) manual page.

       An example of how to use update-fonts-alias in package maintainer scripts is provided in  the
       Debian Policy Manual.

OPTIONS
       -h, --help displays a brief usage message and exits.

OPERANDS
       update-fonts-alias  takes one or more X font directory names to operate on as operands.  Only
       the final path component of the directory name should be specified; e.g.,
              update-fonts-alias 75dpi
       is correct, while ‘update-fonts-alias /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi’ and ‘update-fonts-alias
       /usr/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi’ are not.

ENVIRONMENT
       COLUMNS
              indicates the width of the terminal device in character cells.  This value is used for
              formatting diagnostic messages.  If not set, the terminal is queried using stty(1)  to
              determine its width.  If that fails, a value of ‘80’ is assumed.

DIAGNOSTICS
   Errors
       usage error: one or more font directories must be provided
              update-fonts-alias  was invoked without operands.  Supply one or more X font directory
              names to operate on.

       usage error: unrecognized option
              update-fonts-alias was invoked with an unrecognized option argument.  Use only the op‐
              tions documented in “OPTIONS”, above.

       fatal error: path to X font directory must be used
              A directory name was supplied that was not an X font directory name.   Supply  X  font
              directory names only.

   Warnings
       warning: absolute path directory was provided
              Usage of absolute paths is deprecated.  Use only the final component of the X font di‐
              rectory name for directory.

       warning: directory does not exist or is not a directory
              The supplied directory was invalid.  update-fonts-alias skipped it.

EXIT STATUS
       0      update-fonts-alias ran successfully.

       1      update-fonts-alias  experienced  a fatal error; see the section on diagnostic messages
              above.

       2      update-fonts-alias was invoked with invalid arguments.

BUGS
       See the Debian Bug Tracking System ⟨https://bugs.debian.org/xfonts-utils⟩.  If  you  wish  to
       report a bug in update-fonts-alias, please see /usr/share/doc/debian/bug-reporting.txt or the
       reportbug(1) command.

AUTHOR
       update-fonts-alias was written by Branden Robinson.

SEE ALSO
       mkfontdir(1x)

Debian Project                               2004-11-11                        update-fonts-alias(8)