Search Docs by Keyword

Table of Contents

Mathematica GUI Fonts

The Mathematica GUI requires its own set on fonts to run correctly when used on the FASRC cluster. To be able to run an Interactive, GUI session/job, there are a few steps that will need to be taken. This goes for sessions over SSH, as well as VDI sessions.

OSX/Linux Systems:

OSX and Linux systems are the simplest to set up. Linux has X natively, which is what needs the specific Mathematica fonts.
OSX versions after 10.7 should install the XQuartz package which replaces the native X11 app which shipped with earlier versions of OSX.
Create a directory to hold the fonts:

mkdir ~/mathfonts
cd ~/mathfonts

Download the fonts archive:

mathematica_fonts.tar

Extract the fonts:

tar -xzvf mathematica-fonts.tgz
rm mathematica-fonts.tgz

The fonts are now installed, but you must tell the X server to use them. This will need to be before you connect to the cluster, each time you wish to connect to run Mathematica. For this reason, you may want to add it to your local (not cluster) .bashrc/.tcshrc. The fonts must be added to the X server in a particular order:

NOTE: /full/path/to/fonts/ below is a placeholder for the full path to the newly installed fonts. You will need to replace
it with the path where you’ve just installed the fonts. You can derive this by typing pwd while you’re still in ~/mathfonts.
xset fp+ /full/path/to/fonts/Type1
xset fp+ /full/path/to/fonts/BDF
xset fp rehash

You may now login to the cluster as normal, load the Mathematica module, and work as normal.

Windows Instructions

Windows Instructions are very similar, only you will be operating inside your Cygwin/Xming environment. Cygwin/Xming needs to be installed, with an Xserver, and that XServer should be running. For more information, please see: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ug/cygwin-x-ug.html
With Cygwin/Xming running, perform the following:
Create a directory to hold the fonts:

mkdir ~/mathfonts
cd ~/mathfonts

Download the fonts archive:

mathematica_fonts.tar

Extract the fonts:

tar -xzvf mathematica-fonts.tgz
rm mathematica-fonts.tgz

The fonts are now installed, but you must tell the X server to use them. This will need to be before you connect to the cluster, each time you wish to connect to run Mathematica. For this reason, you may want to add it to your local (not cluster) .bashrc/.tcshrc.
Please note, the fonts must be in a path without spaces/special characters, otherwise the XServer will fail to find them. Many times Cygwin will have spaces in your users home directory. If this is the case, you may want to move the fonts outside that directory,such as /mathfonts.
NOTE: /full/path/to/fonts/ below is a placeholder for the full path to the newly installed fonts. You will need to replace it with the path where you’ve just installed the fonts. You can derive this by typing pwd while you’re still in ~/mathfonts.
The fonts must be added to the X server in a particular order:

xset fp+ /full/path/to/fonts/Type1
xset fp+ /full/path/to/fonts/BDF
xset fp rehash

You may now login to the cluster as normal, load the Mathematica module, and work as normal.


We are grateful for assistance from the Pennsylvania State University HPC group in helping with this solution.

© The President and Fellows of Harvard College
Except where otherwise noted, this content is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.