X11 font -adobe-helvetica-%s-%s-*-*-%d-*-*-*-*-*-*-*, face 2 at size 11 could not be loaded

Solution 1:

I got this same issue using R in Ubuntu 14.04 specifically with the GGALLY package and the GGPAIRS function. To recreate:

data(mtcars)
library(GGally)  
mtcars_subset <- mtcars[,c(2:11)]
ggpairs(mtcars_subset)

Error:
Warning message:  
Error in grid.Call.graphics(L_text, as.graphicsAnnot(x$label), x$x, x$y,  : X11 font -adobe-helvetica-%s-%s-*-*-%d-*-*-*-*-*-*-*, face 1 at size 16 could not be loaded

To fix this loaded the following and rebooted Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install t1-xfree86-nonfree ttf-xfree86-nonfree ttf-xfree86-nonfree-syriac xfonts-75dpi xfonts-100dpi

Solution 2:

Had the same problem with R4.0 on Ubuntu 18. Installing the packages “gsfonts-x11”, “xfonts-base”, “xfonts-scalable”, “xfonts-100dpi” and “xfonts-75dpi” fixed the problem for me.

Thanks to Pepe_Le_Pew for the solution

Solution 3:

In ubuntu 18.04 the problem can appear again. It was enough, in my case to indicate the right bitmap.

options(bitmapType="cairo")