Tiny fonts preclude my using GoboLinux

Hi all,

After hearing about GoboLinux' unique architecture, I was anxious to
try it, so I downloaded, burned and booted. And I couldn't operate it.

The problem wasn't the new directory setup, or the new philosophy. The
problem was that no matter how hard I squinted, I couldn't read the
screen for more than 10 seconds without having to quit because of
eyestrain. This was true of both the Virtual Terminal framebuffer and
the GUI Awesome window manager. Awesome was especially frustrating
because its menu not only had tiny print, but it was dark blue over
black. I had to hover over each item to turn it cyan so I could muscle
my eyes into reading it. 

One menu item was "configure Awesome" or some such, so I said "hooray"
and chose it. Unfortunately, the config file file came up in the
tiniest imaginable font, in nano, an editor with which I'm just not
familiar. Sometimes you can operate an invisible editor, long enough to
enlarge its font, from memory of how the editor works. But not if
you're not familiar with the editor. 

I finally managed to install gVim and by memory set its font to 16pt,
and finally got a readable xterm with xterm -fx 12x24, but it took a
long time to figure out what file to edit for Awesome, because nano's
print was so microscopic I couldn't read the filename.

After 40 minutes trying to figure out how to tell Awesome to use bigger
fonts and much higher contrast menus, I gave up on Awesome and decided
to install LXDE, with which I'm so familiar I could enlarge fonts in my
sleep. Oops, there was no LXDE package to install. Or Lxde. Or lxde
(what's with the caps?). Same with Openbox.

After about 3 hours of getting nowhere but getting a blinding headache,
I gave up.

Please keep in mind, I'm not a prima donna. I use both Devuan and Void
Linux regularly, and within the past 3 years have used quite a bit of
Ubuntu and Debian too. I didn't complain about fonts because they were
big enough for me to figure out how to enlarge. In the past 3 years
I've worked in LXDE, Xfce, Openbox and IceWM, and was able to work with
them well enough to get fonts where I needed them. If GoboLinux's fonts
are preventing me from using it, it's pretty likely they're preventing
a lot of people from getting to see the magic of a directory-installed
distro. And that would be a shame.

I have some suggestions:

1) Set the CLI Virtual Terminal framebuffer to somewhere between an
   80x25 screen and 100x30. Virtual terminals are vital for many Linux
   tasks, and the current 200x60 or whatever framebuffer serves no
   purpose but to preclude some people from using it. And please
   remember, there's no easy way to reset the framebuffer resolution.

2) Boot GUI to big fonts with easy to read contrast. Especially, make
   the Awesome menu be bright white on black so it's readable by all.
   Then, for those with such perfect vision that high contrast gives
   them headaches and they can use a screen with 8 complete 80x24
   Xterms on it, have a shellscript to change settings to tinyfonts and
   also restart awesome. Have an equivalent shellscript to go to big
   fonts (and I mean too big for the average person) with high
   contrast, and then restart Awesome.

3) Set up Grub so as to display the Grub menu for 10 seconds before
   picking the default, so that the user can step in and define a
   different boot. Consider having a big font and small font Grub
   choice, as long as the Grub menu itself is easily readable.

4) Document how to change Awesome's fonts and colors, and have that
   documentation be prominent upon boot. If you make the other changes,
   I might be able to do some of that documentation.

I know what I'm asking for requires some work, and makes the boot-up
default look and feel something adverse to what the current designers
prefer. Consider thought, one can always shrink fonts and dull
contrast, but without a readable font, the poor-visioned user is in a
Catch 22: He could grow the fonts if only he could read the screen, and
he could read the screen if only he could grow the fonts.

I suspect a lot of people, who could be valuable to the core mission of
your project (and that core mission isn't aesthetics), would come on
board if only they could read the screen.

SteveT

Steve Litt 
April 2017 featured book: Troubleshooting Techniques
     of the Successful Technologist
http://www.troubleshooters.com/techniques
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