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Ubuntu 12.04 unstable: Dual screen with two Monitors of different definition

Asked by Etienne V.

Is there a way to do dual screen with monitors that have different definitions (different PPI)?
When I use them in dual screen, it's technically working correctly.
But as their PPI is very different it's ugly. Fonts are little on one and very big on the other.
My first monitor is 15" 1920x1080 (146,86 PPI) and the second that is older is 22" 1680x1050 (90.05 PPI).
I would like to have the fonts displayed "visually" with the same size on both.

I have seen that with Windows 7 we can do it.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Make-the-text-on-your-screen-larger-or-smaller
You set a separate zoom level for each monitor.

It's there something similar on Ubuntu?
A command line tool is great for me.
Experimental project?

I do all my daily job with Ubuntu and it could be great to use dual screen correctly.
I am using the latest Ubuntu 12.04.

Regards,
/Etienne

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Belenos (belenos) said : 		#1

Maybe RandR can solve your problem. Test this: http://albertomilone.com/urandr.html

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Etienne V. (evrignaud) said : 		#2

I don't see whats different with the tool provided by default in Ubuntu to configure dual screens.
Dual screen is working well for me. No problem.
The problem is the size of the fonts that are displayed.
As the PPI is very different, on one monitor the same application seems to have too big fonts and small on the other.

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Etienne V. (evrignaud) said : 		#3

I tried urandr and there is no notion of per display zoom level.

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Launchpad Janitor (janitor) said : 		#4

This question was expired because it remained in the 'Open' state without activity for the last 15 days.

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Etienne V. (evrignaud) said : 		#5

I still have this problem.
I don't know in what direction to search more.
Can someone give me some help?

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Etienne V. (evrignaud) said : 		#6

I'd like to correct one point.
With Windows 7 you can do what is described here (http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Make-the-text-on-your-screen-larger-or-smaller), but the zoom level is the same for each monitor.

In addition, I found this which is usefull. http://askubuntu.com/questions/60044/how-do-i-change-the-font-dpi-settings
Mainly the following command:
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface text-scaling-factor 1

It helps when I am using only my laptop. (Which is my 15" display).

Any other ideas to solve this problem?

Is it possible to setup different profiles for the same user so that I can switch depending on my usage?

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Etienne V. (evrignaud) said : 		#7

It could be great to be able to change the text-scaling-factor from the Unity control panel.

Could Unity be able to switch from one profile to another?

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Brett Sutton (bsutton) said : 		#8

This really is a major problem particularly if you have less than 20/20 vision.

We really should be able to have fonts that actually display at their correct size (e.g. 12 points is 12/72 of an inch) regardless of the dimensions and resolution of the monitor.

I've done a fair bit of research and this seems to be a problem that keeps getting swept under the rug. Isn't it about time we got this one fixed?

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Launchpad Janitor (janitor) said : 		#9

This question was expired because it remained in the 'Open' state without activity for the last 15 days.

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Anthony O. (netangel+launchpad) said : 		#10

I have the same problem here and this is really anoying because my screens are really different. See my question here http://askubuntu.com/questions/393400/is-it-possible-to-have-two-different-dpi-configurations-for-two-differnt-screens