Ulauncher: Issue with fonts on HiDPI display

[billop]

I'm running Arch Linux with KDE, and for some reason the dev version won't build so I was using v4.3.1.r4. On my 4K screen Ulauncher is tiny and the text spacing is off:

[zetorian]

have you properly set environment variables?
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/HiDPI#GUI_toolkits

[billop]

Yes, I have been using Arch Linux with a 4k screen for several years now and I have it set up for every GUI toolkit except for JavaFX (never figured it out). But a lot of applications account for it themselves, Rofi for example simply has a a dpi variable to adjust for different resolution screens.

[gornostal]

@UnicodeAlt255 I'm assuming you've tried GDK_SCALE or GDK_DPI_SCALE, because Ulauncher uses GTK.
I'll come back to this issue once I find a 4k screen.

[friday]

Pretty sure now this is caused by text-scaling-factor which is separate from the mentioned variables.

Repro instructions: Run the code snippet below in a terminal and type something (ex "ulauncher") while it's temporarily using text-scaling-factor 2 (it reverts back after 10s).

No special screen (or KDE) should be needed.

scalingfactor=$(gsettings get org.gnome.desktop.interface text-scaling-factor)
ulauncher-toggle
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface text-scaling-factor 2
sleep 10
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface text-scaling-factor $scalingfactor

[gornostal]

I've recently got laptop with HiDPI screen, Ulauncher doesn't look as bad as on the screenshot thought.
Actually it looks OK, but images are in low resolution. We need to fix that

[Karrq]

I'm also using a HiDPI screen with KDE on Arch and I get the same issue as OP

[gornostal]

@Karrq have you tried the solution suggested above by @friday?

[friday]

@gornostal It isn't a solution. It's code to reproduce the issue and then revert to your previous settings.

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface text-scaling-factor 1 should "solve" it, but then the font will be very small on big displays.

[gornostal]

ah, I see.

So then ulauncher has to take into account text-scaling-factor by adjusting the font size, right?

[friday]

I would say the best case scenario is Ulauncher adjusting the "line height" and possibly other aspects of the size according to the text-scaling-factor, to respect user preferences. I'm not too acquainted with GtkBuilder/Glade myself so I don't know how it works.

Making the text smaller so Ulauncher looks consistent and not broken (but doesn't respect text-scaling-factor) should be an improvement too.

[gornostal]

OK. Thanks for the suggestion

[crabvk]

A little hack, but makes look better

diff --git a/usr/share/ulauncher/ui/result_item.ui b/result_item.ui
index 2fab860..3df4fed 100644
--- a/usr/share/ulauncher/ui/result_item.ui
+++ b/result_item.ui
@@ -58,7 +58,7 @@
                     </style>
                   </object>
                   <packing>
-                    <property name="y">5</property>
+                    <property name="y">0</property>
                   </packing>
                 </child>
                 <child>
@@ -75,7 +75,7 @@
                     </style>
                   </object>
                   <packing>
-                    <property name="y">28</property>
+                    <property name="y">34</property>
                   </packing>
                 </child>
               </object>

Apply with

sudo patch /usr/share/ulauncher/ui/result_item.ui result_item.ui.patch

My GDK_DPI_SCALE=1.66, so you may need different "y" property values.

Before and after

[friday]

Nice! Should be possible to set those to a value relative to the scaling factor before displaying it imo.