[Tex/LaTex] LyX, How to use more than the thirteen Roman fonts listed under Document Settings Fonts

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I noticed that LyX 2.0.6 has a very limited selection of Roman (Serif) fonts listed under the Document Settings Fonts dropdown menu. I'd like to be able to use any of the LaTeX fonts that come with my TeXLive or MIKTeX installation, that came bundled with the LyX installation.

I use LyX 2.0.6 in Kubuntu and Windows, and no matter which document class I set, there are always those very same fonts to pick from, but no more.

  • Roman fonts listed on the LyX Document Settings Fonts dropdown menu:

    • Default
    • Latin Modern Roman
    • Computer Modern Roman
    • AE (Almost European)
    • Times Roman
    • Palatino
    • Bitstream Charter
    • New Century Schoolbook
    • Bookman
    • Utopia
    • Bera Serif
    • Concrete Roman
    • Zapf Chancery

** Kubuntu (TeXLive) version's dropdown menu also says this font is "(Not Installed)" That's Bera Serif and Concrete Roman.

I checked the TUG Font Catalog to pick a favorite, and some that I thought were popular are not listed in the LyX dropdown menu. Here are some highlights of those not included in the dropdown.

  • Missing:

    • Garamond
    • DejaVu Serif
    • Linux Libertine
      and many others.

    I noticed that LyX includes four typefaces that aren't even listed in the TUG font catalog:

    • Zapf Chancery
    • Concrete Roman
    • Bitstream Charter
    • AE (Almost European)

I'm not worried about why LyX choose thirteen serif fonts to put on their dropdown menu, or why a couple of them I suppose aren't part of their GNU/Linux installation package (TeXLive), or why four of them aren't available in the TUG font catalog for browsing.

I'm writing a novel and researched popular books and the fonts they use. Harry Potter and Hunger Games both use Garamond, for instance. If it's a huge effort to add fonts to LyX, then I'll just add that one. By the way, it appears that the regular latin alphabet for Utopia is identical to Garamond, according to the TUG font catalog.

The LyX manual says that other fonts can be added. It instructs to look into the fonts manual. Where do I find the manuals for the fonts that TeXLive or MIKTeX installs? I need to find out how to add all the other LaTeX fonts. By the way, I don't care to explore XeTeX yet. I'm looking for a superb typeset finish in pdf form.

Best Answer

LyX 2.1 has support for new fonts. Note, in particular, the URW Garamond and Libertine additions.

LyX 2.1 is in beta 2 and is stable (we have had no serious reports of new bugs). You can easily install the development version of 2.1 in Ubuntu with the PPA without risk of conflict with your current 2.0.x version.

Otherwise, use XeTeX or LuaTeX. Your fears that LyX will have problems typesetting them are not correct. The XeTeX and LuaTeX engines do all of the work, not LyX.

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