Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
133  6434 
Philipp Lenssen wrote in
<2n************@uni-berlin.de> Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
My twopenn'orth would be that the "problem" ocurs because of a conflating of
print and web design criteria. Web design, IMHO, shouldn't be dependent on
specific fonts.
For the web, fonts are only suggestions anyway and the producer of the page
isn't obliged to nominate a font at all, that can be decided by the
end-user; for print design, the producer is obliged to nominate a font and
the end user can't influence the font at all.
I know it's the often less-than-satisfactory "stop wanting that" answer but
my concern is that, by introducing features that make web pages more like
print pages, the flexibility of the web page will be lost for relatively
little gain.
--
PeterMcC
If you feel that any of the above is incorrect,
inappropriate or offensive in any way,
please ignore it and accept my apologies.
"Philipp Lenssen" <in**@outer-court.com> wrote in news:2np8giF34ob6U1
@uni-berlin.de: Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
There is no reason to want this.
Additionally, there is no standardized method.
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Additionally, an image's text cannot be selected or searched, and a
number of other bad things (good luck getting indexed, good luck with
bandwidth fees).
The trick is to stop wanting this. Users don't care what font the page
is in, as long as it is legible, so font embedding even if possible would
not be worth it. It is generally only wanted by people who don't notice
that the Web is not a print medium.
--
In a room with thirty-seven people, never have everybody shake each
other's hand.
In message <2n************@uni-berlin.de>, Philipp Lenssen
<in**@outer-court.com> writes Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Who knows? Not the w3c, that's for sure -- unless they're working on
something we don't know about ;-)
Still, at least for the time being we can use Microsoft's WEFT facility
to provide a downloaded font to IE users.
Graphic forms of text are with us for the foreseeable future as a lot of
designers will want to offer 'drop-shadows' or text that fits a curve,
etc.
regards.
--
Jake
On Mon, 9 Aug 2004, PeterMcC wrote: Philipp Lenssen wrote
Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
This is a presentation issue, and thus not the business of HTML. [1]
The stylesheets group would be a more comfortable home for discussion
IMHO.
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution
I agree, it certainly can't be...
(it's a bit of a hassle to maintain and create).
....but that wouldn't be my criterion. "Force" doesn't work on the
WWW: what will your image sound like on a speaking browser? Maybe more
to the point from where you're standing: what will it "look" like to
an indexing robot?
Yup, "alt" text. But not all indexing robots take alt text seriously.
My twopenn'orth would be that the "problem" ocurs because of a
conflating of print and web design criteria. Web design, IMHO,
shouldn't be dependent on specific fonts.
Agreed. Shouldn't be "dependent on".
I know it's the often less-than-satisfactory "stop wanting that"
answer but my concern is that, by introducing features that make web
pages more like print pages, the flexibility of the web page will be
lost for relatively little gain.
As long as the designer can keep in mind that font suggestions are in
the final analysis optional, I don't see that downloadable fonts are
all -that- harmful to web page flexibility. But the relative lack of
practical support must tell us something, no?
cheers
[1] Of course I'm ruling out any idea of using downloadable fonts
for the purpose of extending the character repertoire: HTML already
-has- a mechanism (Unicode) for extended character repertoire.
"Philipp Lenssen" <in**@outer-court.com> wrote in message
news:2n************@uni-berlin.de... Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Besides what others have said, wouldn't a couple of factors be (1) download
time and (2) the fact that font rendering in most browsers uses the
underlying operating system's font rendering mechanism and the related
platform-dependent font definition formats?
"Alan J. Flavell" <fl*****@ph.gla.ac.uk> wrote: [1] Of course I'm ruling out any idea of using downloadable fonts
for the purpose of extending the character repertoire: HTML already
-has- a mechanism (Unicode) for extended character repertoire.
However, there aren't many fonts that cover the whole Unicode range ;
and AFAIK no mainstream browsers include them by default (since they
cost money or have restrictive licensing terms).
And so, each time I view pages including MathML, I'm warned that some
characters may not be available unless I download special math fonts.
--;K
On Mon, 9 Aug 2004, Mad Bad Rabbit wrote: However, there aren't many fonts that cover the whole Unicode range ;
True. And it's probably not useful to have one! - since there are
few people who are able to read all of the writing systems which are
included in there.
What most people want is rich coverage of the repertoires in which
they are interested, rather than (say) WGL4's partial coverage of
everything... This might mean getting several fonts, one for each
area of interest. Hopefully in a compatible style.
And so, each time I view pages including MathML, I'm warned that some
characters may not be available unless I download special math fonts.
Indeed. So what's it to be? If you download your special math fonts
once, you are done[1] - Or do you want to download a (partial) font
dynamically for every unusual character which is included in a
document? (Depends how well they get cached, I suppose).
By the way, as some recent MS alerts have shown us, fonts are
sufficiently complex objects to be a potential site of security
compromise. I suppose this means that a downloadable font in a web
page has to be treated with some reserve, as one might treat a Java
applet, Mozilla installable plugin, etc.
all the best
[1] Or should be, if you have a competent browser which knows how to
use the fonts. (IE has some rather quaint ideas of how to do font
management vis a vis character repertoire. Or do I mean
"manglement"?)
"Alan J. Flavell" <fl*****@ph.gla.ac.uk> wrote in
news:Pi*******************************@ppepc56.ph. gla.ac.uk: [1] Of course I'm ruling out any idea of using downloadable fonts
for the purpose of extending the character repertoire: HTML already
-has- a mechanism (Unicode) for extended character repertoire.
What if you need to use Tengwar? :-P
--
In a room with thirty-seven people, never have everybody shake each other's
hand.
Philipp Lenssen wrote: Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it to be displayed on the
page?
Copyright issues.
--
jmm dash list (at) sohnen-moe (dot) com
(Remove .AXSPAMGN for email)
On Mon, 9 Aug 2004, Sam Hughes wrote: [1] Of course I'm ruling out any idea of using downloadable fonts
for the purpose of extending the character repertoire: HTML already
-has- a mechanism (Unicode) for extended character repertoire.
What if you need to use Tengwar? :-P
Then I'd likely feed the terms "Tengwar" and "Unicode" into google,
and follow the suggestions which come out.
In short, Unicode has Private Use Areas for characters which haven't
yet been assigned a place of their own.
Alternatively, you -could- use charset=x-user-defined, after which
it's basically down to out-of-band negotiations between you and your
readers. But of course you -must- use coded characters for that,
since - ex hypothesi - there are no applicable &#number; values
available for your characters.
Alan J. Flavell wrote:
As long as the designer can keep in mind that font suggestions are in
the final analysis optional, I don't see that downloadable fonts are
all -that- harmful to web page flexibility. But the relative lack of
practical support must tell us something, no?
That's what I was interested in. Why is there no agreed-upon standard
to provide font-downloads. Sure, there are security issues, there are
speed issues, traffic, etc., but these can be solved.
And even if there is a standard, not every site must use it, and most
sites might fare well with their choice of either Arial or Times New
Roman, or nothing at all, or whatever they prefer (there are not many
more *pragmatic* choices, though yes in theory there's a whole set of
great fonts you can define along with fallbacks... only that
practically no one will see this).
See I would never put an image of text on my own site(s), but every day
(professionally) I have to maintain sites using text-images (I'm
talking about multi-language sites). This is a hassle and would be much
easier with a good font-download standard. Where are the initiatives to
makes this become reality? Why do their seem to be so little?
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
Sam Hughes wrote: "Philipp Lenssen" <in**@outer-court.com> wrote in news:2np8giF34ob6U1
@uni-berlin.de:
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Additionally, an image's text cannot be selected or searched, and a
number of other bad things (good luck getting indexed, good luck with
bandwidth fees).
The trick is to stop wanting this. Users don't care what font the
page is in, as long as it is legible, so font embedding even if
possible would not be worth it. It is generally only wanted by
people who don't notice that the Web is not a print medium.
What makes you think readers don't care about the font?
And why do you think this is about *me* needing to stop want this? I
don't want this, it is the *designer's* choice. I'm the one
*implementing* this in the best possible way.
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
In article <2n************@uni-berlin.de>, in**@outer-court.com says... Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Philipp . . . I'll GLADLY come to your rescue here and agree with you 10000000000%!
Yes yes YES there should be a way of forcing one's page to view, using the fonts the
designer/author originally intended.
Did the viewer design the page? No. The author did; and for better or worse it is
HIS creation, HIS fashion disaster, HIS intelligible gibberish, HIS concept!
OMG I can't believe how cold some of you people are! Have you no compassion for the
author of the page? Philipp is so completely right that there ought to be no
discussion on it! Here some poor soul spends a month designing his unique web page,
using the fonts that he intended, only to have it slapped down. You might as well
say that you prefer a DOS environment to Windows!
(you can tell I have passionate views about this LOL)
Security Schlamurity. This is Burger King and we ought at the BARE MINIMUM to have
the option to force our creation to be displayed in the way we intended it. I think
it's pathetic that the only option to retain one's original creation is by creating
it as a bloated PDF.
Angel
Curious Angel wrote: Yes yes YES there should be a way of forcing one's page to view,
There is. Use the pdf format. Better still, skip the middle man and
print on hard copy.
Did the viewer design the page? No. The author did; and for better
or worse it is HIS creation, HIS fashion disaster, HIS intelligible
gibberish, HIS concept!
How is this relevant to html?
OMG I can't believe how cold some of you people are! Have you no
compassion for the author of the page?
OMG, please go away and come back if you have something relevant to HTML
to discuss.
some poor soul spends a month designing his unique web page, using
the fonts that he intended, only to have it slapped down.
What a silly waste of time. Shame that poor soul didn't do something
more useful, like creating content.
You might as well say that you prefer a DOS environment to Windows!
No, I might as well not say that. I might as well say I smell a strawman
argument.
I think it's pathetic that the only option to retain one's original
creation is by creating it as a bloated PDF.
I see. You want the popularity of HTML, but the control of PDF. Did it
occur to you why HTML is more popular than PDF?
--
Brian (remove ".invalid" to email me) http://www.tsmchughs.com/
Curious Angel <by*******@usa.net> wrote in
news:MP************************@news.intergate.com : Security Schlamurity. This is Burger King and we ought at the BARE
MINIMUM to have the option to force our creation to be displayed in
the way we intended it. I think it's pathetic that the only option to
retain one's original creation is by creating it as a bloated PDF.
Force? Force?
force?
force?
You want to force such-and-such?
The Web is not about having a file format in which information is
rendered as the author desires.
--
In a room with thirty-seven people, never have everybody shake each
other's hand.
In message <MP************************@news.intergate.com>, Curious
Angel <by*******@usa.net> writes In article <2n************@uni-berlin.de>, in**@outer-court.com says... Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Philipp . . . I'll GLADLY come to your rescue here and agree with you
10000000000%!
Yes yes YES there should be a way of forcing one's page to view, using
the fonts the
designer/author originally intended.
Did the viewer design the page? No. The author did; and for better or
worse it is
HIS creation, HIS fashion disaster, HIS intelligible gibberish, HIS concept!
OMG I can't believe how cold some of you people are! Have you no
compassion for the
author of the page? Philipp is so completely right that there ought to be no
discussion on it! Here some poor soul spends a month designing his
unique web page,
using the fonts that he intended, only to have it slapped down. You
might as well
say that you prefer a DOS environment to Windows!
(you can tell I have passionate views about this LOL)
Security Schlamurity. This is Burger King and we ought at the BARE
MINIMUM to have
the option to force our creation to be displayed in the way we intended
it. I think
it's pathetic that the only option to retain one's original creation is
by creating
it as a bloated PDF.
Angel
But all is not lost ....... if your audience uses Internet Explorer --
and that's what? 85%? 90%? ?95%? of your potential audience.
Using Microsoft's font downloading technology you can make sure that the
vast majority of your viewers gets to see your site as you intended it
to be seen.
Non-IE viewers get to see it in whatever other font you suggest -- or
their own preferred font.
Forget PDFs -- think font embedding.
regards.
--
Jake
In message <2n************@uni-berlin.de>, Philipp Lenssen
<in**@outer-court.com> writes Sam Hughes wrote:
"Philipp Lenssen" <in**@outer-court.com> wrote in news:2np8giF34ob6U1
@uni-berlin.de:
> No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
> web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
> which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
> maintain and create).
Additionally, an image's text cannot be selected or searched, and a
number of other bad things (good luck getting indexed, good luck with
bandwidth fees).
The trick is to stop wanting this. Users don't care what font the
page is in, as long as it is legible, so font embedding even if
possible would not be worth it. It is generally only wanted by
people who don't notice that the Web is not a print medium.
What makes you think readers don't care about the font?
And why do you think this is about *me* needing to stop want this? I
don't want this, it is the *designer's* choice. I'm the one
*implementing* this in the best possible way.
It's *your* site; *you* decide how your audience sees it.
regards.
--
Jake
On Tue, 10 Aug 2004, Sam Hughes wrote: The Web is not about having a file format in which information is
rendered as the author desires.
If the author desires that the content should be rendered as best
suits the reader, then I'm entirely happy with that.
On Tue, 10 Aug 2004, jake wrote: It's *your* site;
It's the reader's browser. It's google's indexing service.
*you* decide how your audience sees it.
*you* decide whether your audience can be bothered.
regards.
Indeed.
"Alan J. Flavell" <fl*****@ph.gla.ac.uk> wrote in
news:Pi*******************************@ppepc56.ph. gla.ac.uk: On Tue, 10 Aug 2004, Sam Hughes wrote:
The Web is not about having a file format in which information is
rendered as the author desires.
If the author desires that the content should be rendered as best
suits the reader, then I'm entirely happy with that.
I disagree! If the author desires that, then it should be rendered with
five-pixel-high small caps text with color schemes such as red on brown,
yellow on red, and green on blue. ;-)
You know, I've always wondered if informational and structural markup would
be more popular if rendering engines randomized their behavior for every
document. Or just set it at random at installation.
--
Anqdc>
In article <Jv**************@gododdin.demon.co.uk>, ja**@gododdin.demon.co.uk says... But all is not lost ....... if your audience uses Internet Explorer --
and that's what? 85%? 90%? ?95%? of your potential audience.
Using Microsoft's font downloading technology you can make sure that the
vast majority of your viewers gets to see your site as you intended it
to be seen.
Non-IE viewers get to see it in whatever other font you suggest -- or
their own preferred font.
Forget PDFs -- think font embedding.
regards.
--
Jake
Well I'm unclear what that is Jake, but if it allows me to present my page in the
style I originally designed it in (well, its fonts, at any rate) . . . I'm all for
it!!
I will defend the rights of the author of the web page to control its appearance
every time! Acrobat is B.L.O.A.T.W.A.R.E in the extreme. Prettyware, certainly.
But bloatware. Your resources shouldn't have to be sucked dry just to display a
lousy font tsk.
Now I don't have a problem with HTML staying as "lean-n-mean" as it is currently
(after all, DOS has some unique advantages) but what I would hope for would be
something almost as lean as HTML . . . that permits fonts. That's all.
And to everybody who says "I control your page, not you" . . . phhhhllltttttt!! You
take what I give you honey, and don't you EVER forget it! (well, someone had to say
it tsk) Visit another site if the appearance of mine so offends your delicate
instincts. I've certainly exercised that right. There are some websites that
contain dominant color combinations which just give me a headache -- but I would
defend to the death its author's right to create it that way.
Angel
Philipp Lenssen wrote: Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
It has a lot to do with the font designers being able to assert copyright
over font data. Which is silly, as copyright now lasts for an obscenely
long time.
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Right, and there should be a way for the user to override this in favor of a
font he/she can actually read, in some cases. Verdana is perhaps the worst
offender, especially when a stylesheet is "enhanced" for it and it's
unavailable on the user's system.
--
Shawn K. Quinn
Curious Angel wrote: Philipp . . . I'll GLADLY come to your rescue here and agree with you
10000000000%! Yes yes YES there should be a way of forcing one's page to
view, using the fonts the designer/author originally intended.
Not on my computer.
Did the viewer design the page? No. The author did; and for better or
worse it is HIS creation, HIS fashion disaster, HIS intelligible
gibberish, HIS concept!
And it's my computer, too. I would actually like to be able to *read* the
page, and if there's some god-awful font that looks like crap on my system
were it to be installed, I would not be able to.
OMG I can't believe how cold some of you people are! Have you no
compassion for the author of the page?
Yes, we do. However, the author of an HTML document and the designer of its
style sheet may well be two very different people.
Philipp is so completely right that there ought to be no discussion on it!
Here some poor soul spends a month designing his unique web page, using
the fonts that he intended, only to have it slapped down.
The CSS properties which suggest fonts are not commands that must be obeyed
at all costs, and this is a *feature* of Web technology. Not a limitation,
a *feature*.
If you want "looks the same, every time", use Postscript, PDF, or some
similar format.
You might as well say that you prefer a DOS environment to Windows!
I've said several times that MS-DOS 6.22 was the last great product
Microsoft made and that it was more or less downhill from there.
I think it's pathetic that the only option to retain one's original
creation is by creating it as a bloated PDF.
I think it's pathetic that people want to completely destroy one of the
great advantages of HTML and CSS.
--
Shawn K. Quinn
Sam Hughes <hu****@rpi.edu> wrote: Curious Angel <by*******@usa.net> wrote:
Security Schlamurity. This is Burger King and we ought at the BARE
MINIMUM to have the option to force our creation to be displayed
Force? Force?
Alas, in all current browsers I've tested, "SUBMIT" buttons
don't work as one might hope. Even if I wrap them inside of
deprecated <blink> tags, they won't hypnotize site visitors
or force them to bow before my will and use my desired fonts.
I'm still USE VERDANA! testing with OBEY NOW! subliminal texts
and animated spiral images, but so far without any success...
--;K
Curious Angel wrote: And to everybody who says "I control your page, not you" . . .
phhhhllltttttt!!**You take what I give you honey, and don't you EVER
forget it!
My browser's back button has yet to wear out. Don't you ever forget *that*.
--
Shawn K. Quinn
jake wrote: It's *your* site; *you* decide how your audience sees it.
Not on the www, I'm afraid. The user has final veto.
--
Brian (remove ".invalid" to email me) http://www.tsmchughs.com/
Curious Angel wrote: You take what I give you honey,
Not so much. Even here, noone has to take what you dish out. That's
what filters are for.
Visit another site if the appearance of mine so offends your
delicate instincts.
Oh, they will, they will. Don't you worry about that.
There are some websites that contain dominant color combinations
which just give me a headache -- but I would defend to the death
its author's right to create it that way.
No argument from me. But see, I'd also point out the user still has
final say in how it ultimately gets presented. And this has nothing to
do with rights or wrongs. It's simply how it is. Whining won't change
it. You can learn to live with it, or keep babbling about how you want
to force things to be *your* way.
--
Brian (remove ".invalid" to email me) http://www.tsmchughs.com/
Curious Angel wrote: Using Microsoft's font downloading technology you can make sure that the
vast majority of your viewers gets to see your site as you intended it
to be seen.
That sounds like a proprietary technology to me, I wouldn't use it at
all. If, and when CSS3 Web Fonts becomes a recommendation, and is
supported you may be able to use @font-face with the 'src' property
[1], but until then, there is no standardised method of doing this that
is supported by any UA.
I will defend the rights of the author of the web page to control its appearance
every time!
You have the right to remain stubborn and you have the right to suggest
appearance. However, Anything you suggest, can and will be disabled by
some users whether you like it or not. You do not have the right to
force a user to unwillingly use your suggested appearance.
And to everybody who says "I control your page, not you"
You control the content, structure, and default presentation of your
page. Once a user has retrieved your document, the user is free to
modify the presentation in any way. If a user is really keen, then they
also have the right to pass your page through some kind of process, such
as XSLT to convert it into any form they desire. The only thing a user
cannot do with your page is republish or distribute it in any way
without your consent, because that may breach copyright laws.
You take what I give you honey, and don't you EVER forget it! (well, someone had to say
it tsk)
If your presentation is nice, then most people will accept it. However,
there will always be some users who do not like your presentation, and
like to change it in some way, and they have the right to do so! There
is nothing you can do to prevent that, it's only possible make it more
difficult and frustrating for the user, which *must not* be done!
Visit another site if the appearance of mine so offends your delicate
instincts. I've certainly exercised that right.
If you had content I was interested in, then, if needed, I would
override your style sheet anyway I like, so that I could read it. You
are making the site for the users, not just for yourself to read, so the
users need to be kept happy.
[1] http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-webfonts/#referencing
--
Lachlan Hunt http://www.lachy.id.au/
Please direct all spam to ab***@127.0.0.1
Thank you.
On Tue, 10 Aug 2004 19:10:43 -0500, Shawn K. Quinn
<sk*****@xevious.kicks-ass.net> wrote: Philipp Lenssen wrote:
Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
It has a lot to do with the font designers being able to assert copyright
over font data. Which is silly, as copyright now lasts for an obscenely
long time.
And in the name of goddamn Sonny Bono too... !*&^*&%#
On Tue, 10 Aug 2004 13:17:54 -0700, Curious Angel <by*******@usa.net>
wrote: Yes yes YES there should be a way of forcing one's page to view, using
the fonts the
designer/author originally intended.
Let me tell you something.
You are a guest on my computer. You are not my host. I am yours.
When I choose to download your content, you best offer me a presentation I
can be happy with. It's not all about you, sorry.
Never, ever, try to force anything. You end up looking like an ass and you
fail a significant part of the time.
On Tue, 10 Aug 2004 16:36:52 -0700, Curious Angel <by*******@usa.net>
wrote: And to everybody who says "I control your page, not you" . . .
phhhhllltttttt!! You
take what I give you honey, and don't you EVER forget it! (well, someone
had to say
it tsk) Visit another site if the appearance of mine so offends your
delicate
instincts. I've certainly exercised that right. There are some
websites that
contain dominant color combinations which just give me a headache -- but
I would
defend to the death its author's right to create it that way.
You just tipped your hat, sonny. Troll. Plonk.
In message <10************@corp.supernews.com>, Brian
<us*****@julietremblay.com.invalid> writes jake wrote:
It's *your* site; *you* decide how your audience sees it.
Not on the www, I'm afraid. The user has final veto.
This is the www -- the user gets to see exactly what the author is
offering *unless* he or she decides to disenfranchise themselves by
overriding the author's decisions.
And how many do? Not many, I'd bet.
regards.
--
Jake
In message <MP************************@news.intergate.com>, Curious
Angel <by*******@usa.net> writes In article <Jv**************@gododdin.demon.co.uk>,
ja**@gododdin.demon.co.uk says... But all is not lost ....... if your audience uses Internet Explorer --
and that's what? 85%? 90%? ?95%? of your potential audience.
Using Microsoft's font downloading technology you can make sure that the
vast majority of your viewers gets to see your site as you intended it
to be seen.
Non-IE viewers get to see it in whatever other font you suggest -- or
their own preferred font.
Forget PDFs -- think font embedding.
regards.
--
Jake
Well I'm unclear what that is Jake, but if it allows me to present my
page in the
style I originally designed it in (well, its fonts, at any rate) . . .
I'm all for
it!!
[snip]
Well, it's really quite a simple process.
You develop your page locally until you have it looking as you want it
(font-wise).
You then use a Microsoft utility (WEFT) to look at a page (or pages) of
HTML and to provide you with a list of fonts you've used.
You then select a particular font to be 'embedded' (as you think a lot
of people won't have it on their system) and the utility will then
generate a 'font object' (an .eot file) which can then be uploaded to
your server along with your HTML, CSS, images, etc.
When the browser (IE) reads your page, it will check to see if the user
has that font already installed -- if not, it will download the font for
temporary use.
One plus point is that, unlike graphical images, the text can be
re-sized.
Here's a few demos: http://www.microsoft.com/typography/...ng/default.htm
regards.
--
Jake
In message <FM*******************@news-server.bigpond.net.au>, Lachlan
Hunt <la**********@lachy.id.au.invalid> writes Curious Angel wrote:Using Microsoft's font downloading technology you can make sure that
the vast majority of your viewers gets to see your site as you
intended it to be seen.
That sounds like a proprietary technology to me,
Yes. Microsoft technology (the same nice folks that brought you that
proprietary Windows operating system).
I wouldn't use it at all.
Hey. You just do what you've got to do -- free choice.
If, and when CSS3 Web Fonts becomes a recommendation, and is supported
you may be able to use @font-face with the 'src' property [1], but
until then, there is no standardised method of doing this that is
supported by any UA.
Considering the number of IE users, I'd suggest that Microsoft embedding
technology is as close to a standard as your likely to see for a long
time to come.
[snip]
regards.
--
Jake
In message <Y5********************@speakeasy.net>, Shawn K. Quinn
<sk*****@xevious.kicks-ass.net> writes Philipp Lenssen wrote:
Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the
page?
It has a lot to do with the font designers being able to assert copyright
over font data. Which is silly, as copyright now lasts for an obscenely
long time.
It seems to be the case though, that most fonts that I've looked at seem
to be quite happy to allow font embedding because the downloaded font
file can only be used for that Web page, and only remains active in the
user's system as long as the Web page is active.
It's rather like a printed page: One person produces it (the owner of
the license to use the font) -- but many people read it.
No matter what you think of the preferred font of a designer, many
web-sites offer an image of the text instead to "force" this font --
which certainly can't be the solution (it's a bit of a hassle to
maintain and create).
Right, and there should be a way for the user to override this in favor of a
font he/she can actually read, in some cases. Verdana is perhaps the worst
offender, especially when a stylesheet is "enhanced" for it and it's
unavailable on the user's system.
It's slowly becoming a 'Verdana' world ;-)
regards.
--
Jake
jake wrote: This is the www -- the user gets to see exactly what the author is
offering *unless* he or she decides to disenfranchise themselves by
overriding the author's decisions.
And how many do? Not many, I'd bet.
I do, quite often, especially when someone uses awful colours (like
MSDN's IE Blog — I can't stand reading that awful blue text in this post
[1]!), and also for any page that is unreadable with stylesheets enabled
(like this twit I wrote about [2]) because it was designed it to work
only with IEs bugs. Not only that, but I sometimes disable images,
animations, javascript and other annoying content. I've also set up a
user style sheet that stops the <blink> and <marquee> tags, among many
other things.
This ALA article, “Print it Your Way” [3], discusses how to create and
use a user stylesheet to change the way a document gets printed. Chris
Pederick offers a userContent.css file [4] to help users detect
javascript links and links with a target opening a new window. So, in
conclusion, yes, there are many people who do override author styls sheets.
[1] http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2004/07/30/202589.aspx
[2] http://www.lachy.id.au/blogs/nettwits/2004/07/what-mess
[3] http://www.alistapart.com/articles/printyourway/
[4] http://www.chrispederick.com/work/firefox/
--
Lachlan Hunt http://www.lachy.id.au/
Please direct all spam to ab***@127.0.0.1
Thank you.
jake wrote: In message <MP************************@news.intergate.com>, Curious
Angel <by*******@usa.net> writes In article <2n************@uni-berlin.de>, in**@outer-court.com
says... Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on the >> page?
Using Microsoft's font downloading technology you can make sure that
the vast majority of your viewers gets to see your site as you
intended it to be seen.
I tried that. The results were sub-optimal. OK, I can live with the
fact I have to locate and download ancient MS tools nobody seems to use
or support, and I can (barely) live with the fact this will create an
embedded font-package *limited* to the letters present on the page you
want to convert (how can this be? we translate web pages *after* the
HTML and CSS are finished, via XML -- we don't know the actual
letters!) -- but the font was not looking very good, especially the
kerning was messed.
Again, I wanted the discussion to argue downloadable-fonts vs
images-of-text. I sure would prefer the alternative text-as-text (in
any font the user has on his system, like arial), but this is not an
option. Many, many sites use images-of-text and I find this is bad
(it's not really HTML either, it's jpeg, or gif, or png).
I do not believe this matters in terms of search engines, which
understand alt, or if they don't, they'd need to get fixed, not the
page itself or the concept.
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
Curious Angel wrote:
I will defend the rights of the author of the web page to control its
appearance every time! Acrobat is B.L.O.A.T.W.A.R.E in the extreme.
Prettyware, certainly. But bloatware. Your resources shouldn't have
to be sucked dry just to display a lousy font tsk.
Adobe always crashes my computer the first time I start it... unless I
download the PDF first... now I'm having a rather typical WinXP here
and my colleagues as well, and they have the same problem. I really
hate it when authors create a link to a pdf without writing PDF
somewhere in the link, or close to it, so that I'm aware of it (and 90%
of the time I will decide it's not worth the hassle to view the PDF --
it just has the worst usability when viewed on screen).
PDF as a solution to make a pragmatic suggestion is worst.
But I do think we need a way to make pragmatic suggestions when it
comes to fonts. Now of course we can't force it. But wouldn't people
cry out if the browser would mess up say CSS positioning, and double
your pixel values, thus rendering your content invisible? CSS is a
suggestion, but it works in pragmatic enough ways to be usable.
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
Shawn K. Quinn wrote:
And it's my computer, too. I would actually like to be able to read
the page, and if there's some god-awful font that looks like crap on
my system were it to be installed, I would not be able to.
See. I argued that many sites (like the one I maintain) happen to use
*images-of-text* thus because there is no way to otherwise
pragmatically suggest a font. Now what can you do? At least with
embedded font of some sorts you could easily override the font. But
with this approach you are now stuck with the font, can't resize it,
can't easily copy it (depending on the browser), and can't just show
the alt-text of the image unless you turn off all other images. And
that's just the user-pov, the maintenance of images-of-text is also
really bad!
The CSS properties which suggest fonts are not commands that must be
obeyed at all costs, and this is a feature of Web technology. Not a
limitation, a feature.
If you want "looks the same, every time", use Postscript, PDF, or some
similar format.
Nobody wants that. But with that argument, you might as well say *all*
CSS is a failure and belongs to PDF or something else. And yet people
use CSS, and they rely on it. They also know it might not work in some
browsers, but it's a pragmatic choice, or surely everbody would use the
HTML3.2-inline mess (yeah, enough people do, but they just don't know
about CSS or don't want to).
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
Neal wrote: On Tue, 10 Aug 2004 13:17:54 -0700, Curious Angel <by*******@usa.net>
wrote:
Yes yes YES there should be a way of forcing one's page to view,
using the fonts the
designer/author originally intended.
Let me tell you something.
You are a guest on my computer. You are not my host. I am yours.
When I choose to download your content, you best offer me a
presentation I can be happy with. It's not all about you, sorry.
Do you think most people make a conscious decision to have e.g. Times
New Roman as their default web-font? I bet they don't. They wouldn't
even find the options menu to change it, let alone think about the
issue in the first place. Microsoft made the font decision in most
cases, not the user. Yes, it's nice that most of us reading along here
know how to set their favorite font. But even then it's a tough
decision. I couldn't tell you straight away and out of my head wether
I'm faster at reading Garamond vs Times New Roman vs Arial vs Verdana
vs Trebuchet etc.
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
jake <ja**@gododdin.demon.co.uk> wrote: Well, it's really quite a simple process.
Really? You seem to have an ongoing campaign for WEFT in different
newsgroups. In this group, you are clearly off-topic. WEFT is not HTML.
You then use a Microsoft utility (WEFT) to look at a page (or pages)
of HTML and to provide you with a list of fonts you've used.
And stay tuned to trouble if you try anything real, as I have mentioned
in the alt.html thread.
I also repeatedly mentioned that you repeatedly failed to provide _any_
demonstration of your (or anyone else's for that matter) actual use of
WEFT for Web authoring. You posted a single URL that pointed to a trivial
demo with no real content (and, not surprisingly, typographically poor
use of fonts). Instead of posting the URL of your real site utilizing
WEFT, you (not unexpectedly) reacted by moving to other matters such as
personal accusations.
--
Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/
Pages about Web authoring: http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/www.html
Brian wrote: jake wrote:
It's your site; you decide how your audience sees it.
Not on the www, I'm afraid. The user has final veto.
How do you have the final veto if the site uses an image of text?
Yeah sure, there might be many tricks for CSS and HTML and browser
gurus. I'm talking about the average user here. How do you override the
font in say the headline of the Onion's articles?
<http://www.theonion.com/news/index.php?issue=4032>
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
Shawn K. Quinn wrote: Philipp Lenssen wrote:
Why is there no standardized and well-working way for a web-page to
offer the font for download/embed it, in order to be displayed on
the page?
It has a lot to do with the font designers being able to assert
copyright over font data. Which is silly, as copyright now lasts for
an obscenely long time.
The more I know the more I start to dislike patents and copyright.
Either I'm just seeing one side, or I'm on to something...
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
jake wrote: Considering the number of IE users, I'd suggest that Microsoft embedding
technology is as close to a standard as your likely to see for a long
time to come.
Ok, so does that make <marquee> a standard element also? What about all
those other presentational attributes MSIE introduced also, like
leftmargin, topmargin, or whatever the hell they are? So, you're saying
it's ok to use proprietary technologies, so long as 90% of the market
supports it, who cares about interoperability, accessibility, usability
and whatever else is destroyed by using IE's proprietary technology in
other UAs.
--
Lachlan Hunt http://www.lachy.id.au/
Please direct all spam to ab***@127.0.0.1
Thank you.
Philipp Lenssen wrote: How do you have the final veto if the site uses an image of text?
If alt text has been specifed, it doesn't take much effort to disable
images and style the alt text displayed in it's place.
Yeah sure, there might be many tricks for CSS and HTML and browser
gurus. I'm talking about the average user here. How do you override the
font in say the headline of the Onion's articles?
<http://www.theonion.com/news/index.php?issue=4032>
Good alt text was specified for the headlines in this case, so there is
little problem disabling images and then writing additional styles to
make it look the way I want it to. It just takes a little more effort,
since the headlines weren't marked up properly in <h#> elements.
In cases where alt text has not been specified properly, then it's
difficult, but possible. It would require writing a selector for each
image that needed to be replaced with text, and using 'content' to
replace it with appropriate text that can be styled. (for CSS2 UAs,
this would need to be done using ::before or ::afte, and then hide the
actual image. But for CSS3, it 'content' can be applied directly to the
image. I realise this is not an option for the average user, or anyone
that has difficulty reading the image text in the first place, but I
just wanted to show that it is possible.
--
Lachlan Hunt http://www.lachy.id.au/
Please direct all spam to ab***@127.0.0.1
Thank you.
On Wed, 11 Aug 2004, Lachlan Hunt wrote: jake wrote: Considering the number of IE users, I'd suggest that Microsoft
embedding technology is as close to a standard as your likely to
see for a long time to come.
Ok, so does that make <marquee> a standard element also?
Let's not obsess over the precise meaning of "standard" here. The
closest you're going to get to a "standard" in the technical sense
would be ISO-HTML. The next-closest would be the standards-track
RFC1866 (well, it was standards-track when it was issued) for
HTML/2.0. The more-practical versions of HTML with which we deal
every day are either W3C "technical recommendations", or proprietary
extensions, not "standards".
My reading would be that for client agents which follow the original
guidelines of HTML - i.e when encountering an unknown element, to
disregard the opening and closing tags and render the content - the
proprietary <marquee> does no harm at all. In fact it's only harmful
on those client agents which -do- implement it - it then becomes a WAI
violation.
So, you're saying it's ok to use proprietary technologies, so long
as 90% of the market supports it,
Routine answer: its wrong to -rely- on it, but if it can be used in
such a way that it's harmless to those whose browsers don't implement
it, then I'd say it's up to you, basically. I wouldn't choose to do
it myself, but if it does me no harm (I'm of course hoping that the
Mozilla folks wouldn't take it into their heads to go and implement
some harmful proprietary extension, at least not without the option to
turn it off) then I'm neutral on other folks using it. In fact, if
all your competitors would use marquee and blink, you might get some
more customers!
all the best
Lachlan Hunt wrote: Philipp Lenssen wrote: How do you have the final veto if the site uses an image of text?
If alt text has been specifed, it doesn't take much effort to disable
images and style the alt text displayed in it's place.
And loose all the other images at the same time. And having to restart
my browser, possibly, and empty the cache, and... just for the headline.
It's just not realistic. In reality, whatever font you have defined
will be ignored, and you will live with that or leave the site.
--
Google Blogoscoped http://blog.outer-court.com
On Wed, 11 Aug 2004, Philipp Lenssen wrote: How do you have the final veto if the site uses an image of text?
Click the option which turns off images. As I've heard ordinary users
saying to each other - the web developer toolbar isn't only for web
developers.
Yeah sure, there might be many tricks for CSS and HTML and browser
gurus. I'm talking about the average user here.
I'm not sure that we -have- any "average" users around here. :-}
They all come with different expectations and prejudices.
How do you override the
font in say the headline of the Onion's articles?
<http://www.theonion.com/news/index.php?issue=4032>
Lynx says "Bad HTML!!!", and then displays:
[blank.gif]
The Onion A.V. Club | Store | Subscriptions | Books | Personals
Onion Premium Join Login Help
NEWSLETTERS CONTESTS
[blank.gif]
VOLUME 40 ISSUE 32 AMERICA'S FINEST NEWS SOURCE 11 AUGUST 2004
_________________ Search
Front Page News [Recent Issues____] [Jump To____________]
POLITICS
Kerry Unveils One-Point Plan For Better America
[blank.gif]
Advertisement
It looks almost usable to me, though I could do better.
Which substantive content am I missing?
Alan J. Flavell wrote: On Wed, 11 Aug 2004, Lachlan Hunt wrote:
jake wrote: Considering the number of IE users, I'd suggest that Microsoft
embedding technology is as close to a standard as your likely to
see for a long time to come.
Ok, so does that make <marquee> a standard element also?
My reading would be that for client agents which follow the original
guidelines of HTML - i.e when encountering an unknown element, to
disregard the opening and closing tags and render the content - the
proprietary <marquee> does no harm at all. In fact it's only harmful
on those client agents which -do- implement it - it then becomes a
WAI violation.
I did use Marquee before, in an IExplorer Intranet. Facing the choice
between a DHTML version, or a Java-applet, or a simple element, I think
marquee does a good job. As usual I don't believe Microsoft ever
intended it to be used when you *don't* want text to scroll around...
but thinking back to the '90s I believe a lot of people used some kind
of scrolling text for news alerts. (God bless those pages they are all
gone now.)
--
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