Question about fonts

[Junior Waldo]

My fonts are set to "Lucida Grande Regular 11" and I think this must be default because I don't remember ever changing. I would like to be able to italicize things in Miscellaneous Notes as well as in Sources but get a message that Lucida Grande doesn't support italics. Am willing to change to another font but would like to have benefit of other's opinions and as to what makes a good font for Reunion that supports all features.
Advice appreciated, Junior

[Dennis J. Cunniff]

Re: Question about fonts

what makes a good font for Reunion that supports all features.

I think font preference is a very individual thing. Pick any font family that you like, one that supports italics and any foreign characters that are important to you. (For example, if you have a lot of Polish families, you need an ł, etc.) Most modern fonts have everything you need, so any font you like reading and working with should do.

I like my "Bouwsma Text" and "Arno Pro", but your mileage may differ I'm a serif kinda guy. Georgia (serif) and Verdana (sans serif) also are both designed for readability on a computer monitor and may be worth a look.

[Junior Waldo]

Re: Question about fonts

I think font preference is a very individual thing. Pick any font family that you like, one that supports italics and any foreign characters that are important to you. (For example, if you have a lot of Polish families, you need an ł, etc.) Most modern fonts have everything you need, so any font you like reading and working with should do.

I like my "Bouwsma Text" and "Arno Pro", but your mileage may differ I'm a serif kinda guy. Georgia (serif) and Verdana (sans serif) also are both designed for readability on a computer monitor and may be worth a look.

Thanks Dennis,
I think I'll try Verdana because it does seem to be very easy to read on screen and also compatible with Word.

[Michael Talibard]

Re: Question about fonts

Yes, Verdana works well. For 'fields under buttons' in Family View, take a look also at Trebuchet MS, which fits a bit more into the space, while still being very legible. It's a matter of taste.

[colinc]

Re: Question about fonts

While it is true that the choice of font [or fount as it used to be pre-Microsoft discovering them!] is personal there are some immutables.

Despite having used Macs since almost day one I have to admit that with Georgia MS did a wonderful job for screen use. It is good in all sizes and as it uses 'old style' numerals typos like O for 0 and 1 for I or l are as clear as they are here [which is not often the case in 'sans' fonts].

For continuous reading I'd always go for a seriffed face, and legibility tests tend to lean in this direction. Personally I only use sans [in my case Gill] for headings to give a page a bit of colour. Gill and Garamond are wonderful together, but Garamond does need a reasonable printer. For printing under any conditions nothing is as good as Palatino, largely because it was designed for newspapers. It is also a very lovely face on a character by character basis and one of very few faces that is good in any size or in italic or in bold.

Perhaps the most important factor when it comes to legibility is line length [60chrs is often quoted, but what we have here is pretty good on screen] and letter spacing. On the whole seriffed faces fare better with too close letter spacing than sans.

Cheers, Colin

[Junior Waldo]

Re: Question about fonts

While it is true that the choice of font [or fount as it used to be pre-Microsoft discovering them!] is personal there are some immutables.

Despite having used Macs since almost day one I have to admit that with Georgia MS did a wonderful job for screen use. It is good in all sizes and as it uses 'old style' numerals typos like O for 0 and 1 for I or l are as clear as they are here [which is not often the case in 'sans' fonts].

For continuous reading I'd always go for a seriffed face, and legibility tests tend to lean in this direction. Personally I only use sans [in my case Gill] for headings to give a page a bit of colour. Gill and Garamond are wonderful together, but Garamond does need a reasonable printer. For printing under any conditions nothing is as good as Palatino, largely because it was designed for newspapers. It is also a very lovely face on a character by character basis and one of very few faces that is good in any size or in italic or in bold.

Perhaps the most important factor when it comes to legibility is line length [60chrs is often quoted, but what we have here is pretty good on screen] and letter spacing. On the whole seriffed faces fare better with too close letter spacing than sans.

Cheers, Colin

Thanks Colin for the additional things to consider. Your thoughts will help me to do some more experimenting.
Junior