https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1389683
--- Comment #11 from Akira TAGOH tagoh@redhat.com --- (In reply to Bojan Smojver from comment #10)
This does not work for me in Gnome. I actually have to set hinting to full using Gnome Tweak Tool (or dconf) to get full hinting going.
You have to do. if you want to override the desktop's anyway, mode="assign" instead of "prepend" or "append" would do the job. though it may give you another confusion in the future. I wouldn't recommend to do that.
That is the confusing bit for me. If I set full hinting in Gnome, but fontconfig has slight (i.e. the symlink in /etc/fonts/conf.d), the fonts are not rendered clearly. I tried symlinking the fontconfig's 10-hinting-full into /etc/fonts/conf.d, but that didn't work either. Neither did suggestion above.
Well, those configuration in /etc/fonts/conf.d doesn't override the desktop configuration if they have. the point is, there are applications doesn't follow the desktop's. they simply read the font configurations from fontconfig. both configurations should has consistency in that sense. but fontconfig as a lower layer library to desktops can't do that and desktops should be responsible IMHO.
Anyway, good to check with fc-match -v | grep hint if you doubt some hinting configuration isn't applied.
PS. Note that I also use autohinting, by symlinking 10-autohint. Without that, all the fonts look way to thin for me.
That is your preference. then changing hintstyle wouldn't help. that's it.