Clean, readable pixel fonts for Mobile Terminal

[brinzei]

If you like the crispness and clarity of pixel fonts, I present you here three pixel fonts, adapted for Mobile Terminal. They are based on some fonts I like (spanning from very small to rather large): Atari Small, Artwiz's Drift and Fixedsys Narrow. I retraced them manually, extended their coverage (Latin-1 and some Latin-2) and modified the metrics to fit on MT.

Before you can use them, they must be installed to the phone. First, copy them to /System/Library/Fonts/Cache. Second, edit CGFontCache.plist and add the following:

In the "Names" Key:

<key>AtariSmall</key>
    <string>/System/Library/Fonts/Cache/AtariSmall.ttf</string>
<key>Drift</key>
    <string>/System/Library/Fonts/Cache/Drift.ttf</string>
<key>FixedsysExcelsior</key>
    <string>/System/Library/Fonts/Cache/FixedsysExcelsior.ttf</string>

In the "TraitMappings" Key:

<key>Atari Small</key>
    <dict>
    <key>Plain</key>
        <string>AtariSmall</string>
    </dict>
<key>Drift</key>
    <dict>
    <key>Plain</key>
        <string>Drift</string>
    </dict>
<key>Fixedsys Excelsior</key>
    <dict>
    <key>Plain</key>
        <string>FixedsysExcelsior</string>
    </dict>

Restart SpringBoard. In Mobile Terminal select 8pt for Atari Small (you have 80 columns/row), 10pt for Drift (64c/row), and 12pt for Fixedsys Excelsior (53c/row).

Note: CGFontCache.plist is a binary file; it must be converted to ASCII so it can be edited. There are some tools to do that (Google will help you locate them). I use Total Commander (http://www.ghisler.com) with a little plug-in called T-PoT (http://code.google.com/p/t-pot/) to transfer files to my phone. T-PoT will convert on-the-fly any .plist from binary to ASCII format so you can edit it freely with any text editor.

Enjoy, make backups.

Links:
Mobile Terminal: http://code.google.com/p/mobileterminal
Atari Small: http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~fine/Tech/x11fonts.html
Artwiz: http://artwizaleczapka.sourceforge.net
Fixedsys: http://www.fixedsysexcelsior.com
Total Commander: http://www.ghisler.com
T-PoT: http://code.google.com/p/t-pot