Foreign language fonts - why can't Firefox provide them?

[Grand Dizzy]

It's annoying having loads of foreign fonts installed on Windows - just in case I ever visit a foreign website. There are dozens of these fonts and they always show up in programs like Photoshop - to everyone's irritation.

Is there any reason why Firefox can't just come pre-packaged with all the foreign language fonts, and use them when needed (just like how embedded fonts work). That way, we wouldn't need to have all these foreign fonts permanently installed in Windows.

[Reflective]

See: https://support.mozilla.org/t5/Manage-p ... ta-p/23542

[James]

So you want Firefox to be even larger in download size on Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux just for something that is or can be on OS.

See: https://support.mozilla.org/t5/Manage-p ... ta-p/23542

This is for the user interface and not fonts.

[dickvl]

Do you know how many languages and alphabets and scripts there are?
It would likely take a few hundred MB to download all possible fonts.
You will have to install fonts for languages that you can read and for others if you visit specific web pages that show little boxes with the hex code of the character if you do not have a font installed that covers this Unicode range.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plane_%28Unicode%29

[Grand Dizzy]

Do you know how many languages and alphabets and scripts there are?

There are 46 alphabets, which makes 184 fonts with bold and italic variants. (Windows comes shipped with 184 foreign language fonts.)

It would likely take a few hundred MB to download all possible fonts.

Well, English fonts are only 100Kb each, but you're right, some of the foreign language fonts are huge. The total file size of all the foreign language fonts is 455Mb! Far too much to download!

But we don't need to install them all, only the ones required by a website. Couldn't Firefox install them automatically?

So you want Firefox to be even larger in download size on Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux just for something that is or can be on OS.

Well, I wouldn't install an oven in every room of my house when I only need one in the kitchen. Likewise, Firefox is the only program which uses those fonts on my computer, so to me it makes sense that they are governed by, and limited to, Firefox alone.

See: https://support.mozilla.org/t5/Manage-p ... ta-p/23542

Ah, thank you! Language packs seems to be the answer I was looking for! I can just uninstall all my foreign fonts from Windows and install a few language packs for foreign websites I visit (Hebrew, Japanese, Russian).

I still don't see why language packs can't just be an automatic feature of Firefox though? Instead of me choosing which packs to install, why doesn't Firefox just give me an alert, like:

"Firefox alert.
This website uses the Hebrew alphabet
which is not available on your computer.
Would you like to install the Hebrew language pack which
will allow you to view all Hebrew websites in future?
☑ Yes ▢ No"

—Why can't Firefox work that way?

[Grumpus]

A Tip
Go into /tools/options/content/fonts&colors and set character encoding for (Other languages (incl. Western) this should get you past specifics.
Also if using Hebrew make sure you have bidi set appropriately (bi-directional)

[James]

See: https://support.mozilla.org/t5/Manage-p ... ta-p/23542

Ah, thank you! Language packs seems to be the answer I was looking for! I can just uninstall all my foreign fonts from Windows and install a few language packs for foreign websites I visit (Hebrew, Japanese, Russian).

I still don't see why language packs can't just be an automatic feature of Firefox though? Instead of me choosing which packs to install, why doesn't Firefox just give me an alert, like:

—Why can't Firefox work that way?

As both the article and I said earlier about the Language Packs, those are Only for the language of the UI or User Interface and not for say web sites. Those Language Packs are basically what you can download at http://www.mozilla.org/firefox/all/

from start of that sumo article

Language packs are add-ons Extensions that let you to have more languages available for the user interface of Firefox.

The article is about the languages of websites.
https://support.mozilla.org/t5/Manage-p ... _languages

[dickvl]

Firefox language packs only include the strings (labels) for the Firefox user interface and are not about fonts.
You will still have make sure that you the required fonts installed if you really want to have the user interface in a different language.
It is not too difficult to install additional font and you would normally have most fonts you encounter installed.
Only CJK fonts and special languages may require to install additional fonts.

Can you provide links to example pages that show little boxes with the hex code as an indication that you do not have a font installed?

Note that website also use icon fonts that are downloaded automatically.
If such icons do not show then you may have content blocking extensions or security software that is blocking these files.
The Web Console would normally show an error message in such a case.

[Grand Dizzy]

Language Packs are Only for the language of the UI or User Interface and not for say web sites.

Oh, I see. It seems very strange that you can install a language pack and it will be available for the user interface of Firefox, but not the websites it shows?

So you're telling me that anyone who installs the Hebrew language pack must already have Hebrew fonts on his system or he couldn't view Hebrew websites! I take it then that the real point of a "language pack" is more about the wording of the menus, rather than the fonts it includes?

[dickvl]

You always need to have fonts installed to be able to see Hebrew characters.
A language pack only has label text (strings) to translate user interface labels to Hebrew.
This has nothing to do with what you see on web pages, but of course still requires to have a suitable font installed because otherwise you won't see any text that is part of translated text in the user interface.
https://dxr.mozilla.org/l10n-mozilla-re ... rowser.dtd
https://dxr.mozilla.org/l10n-mozilla-release/source/he

[Grand Dizzy]

You always need to have fonts installed to be able to see Hebrew characters.

But can't modern websites "embed" fonts, making them available to the browser without actually being installed?

And if a website can use embedding to temporarily display a foreign font, why can't Firefox automatically use the same trick?

For example, if Firefox sees that a page has Korean characters, it goes and gets the Korean fonts from a server and makes them temporarily available, just as though the page had embedded Korean fonts.

[Grumpus]

But can't modern websites "embed" fonts, making them available to the browser without actually being installed?

They use services like @fontface which some people block due to security concerns.

And if a website can use embedding to temporarily display a foreign font, why can't Firefox automatically use the same trick?

Would you be getting the fonts from the Firefox, cloud or from your system, the site is not serving the font the service is serving the font. If from some local storage on your system doesn't this indicate the shortest and current method?

For example, if Firefox sees that a page has Korean characters, it goes and gets the Korean fonts from a server and makes them temporarily available, just as though the page had embedded Korean fonts.

Same as getting it from a service like @fontface, the sites server or your system font server.

You also need to take into consideration substitute fonts which appear like the font you want but have system or font metric issues and differences in text encoding.