Using the X Window System on my workstation, how do I fix the fonts to run Mathematica at IU?

Mathematica makes heavy use of specialized fonts to display mathematical notation. While you can run Mathematica without these fonts, your display may be unintelligible. Mathematica expects to find these fonts on your local workstation, rather than on the remote Unix computer.

On this page:

• Downloading fonts
• Configuring fonts
• Getting help

Downloading fonts

To avoid known conflicts, UITS recommends installing the fonts in a directory separate from your standard X Window System fonts. To download a compressed file containing the Mathematica fonts from Wolfram, the maker of Mathematica, see Mathematica's Latest Fonts.

For help installing new fonts, see your X Server documentation and Wolfram's Fonts on Linux tutorial.

Back to top

Configuring fonts

To configure your installed fonts to display properly in Mathematica at Indiana University:

1. After installing the fonts, connect to your Quarry account using SSH.
   
   
2. Start your X Server, and then launch Mathematica; at the remote prompt, enter: mathematica &

If one of the following errors appears at the remote prompt, you will need to take additional steps:

In either case, before you launch Mathematica, issue the following commands at the remote prompt:

Replace path_to_fonts with the absolute path to the directory containing fonts.dir on your local workstation. You can also use this technique if you have a local copy of Mathematica installed.

Note: You can safely ignore the "Warning: Cannot convert string '....' to type FontStruct" error message.

Back to top

Getting help

For additional information about Mathematica at IU, see the Research Analytics Mathematica page.

If you have questions about using statistical and mathematical software at Indiana University, email UITS Research Analytics (formerly known as the Stat/Math Center). Research Analytics is located on the IU Bloomington campus at Woodburn Hall 200, and is open for consultation by appointment Monday-Friday 9am-5pm. For more, visit Research Analytics on the web, or call 812-855-4724 (IUB) or 317-278-4740 (IUPUI).

Back to top