Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tufte CSS

daveliepmann.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–107 of 107 posts

Re: Tufte CSS

#101

Post by daveliepmann »

jfb wrote: post #12
jacobolus wrote: post #8

Cute idea. Needs a better example document to really be judged properly (for example, this document has a far too many large and imposing headings), but in any case, some comments: Would be better with less leading, a smaller text size, smaller left margin, and more characters per line. This current version has a text block more like a newspaper column width than a book, and the large type and unnecessarily generous…

I get why people want their web sites to look as good as Tufte's books, but since they can't, I wish they wouldn't try. Make things that look good in the medium you're working in; don't blindly copy the rules from other media.

I agree that design is medium-specific, but I think the idea of "looking as good as Tufte's books" is an underspecified one. Can a webpage be a better book than a book? No. Can a webpage be a better webpage by borrowing some ideas from books, then modifying those ideas to fit its own purposes? I think yes.

Re: Tufte CSS

#102

Post by daveliepmann »

bane wrote: post #69

I think this: a) looks like a reasonable simulation of Tufte's print style b) is missing the point Tufte tries to make Tufte isn't saying you have to make your presentation look like his, his basic thesis is "don't add unnecessary things that take away from the clarity of your presentation" and he's made a name by critically analyzing other people's presentation and work to show where they've gone overboard and why t…

While I recognize that any mimicry of Tufte's print approach in CSS is going to come across as prescriptivism, that was not the point. Tufte CSS was a toy project that seemed worth sharing. It turns out, figuring out which of his methods translate from print to the web is not straightforward. It's an exercise. That process of implementing sidenotes (for instance), and thinking about what they mean in the modern web, is valuable. Sidenotes are but one technique, like data-"ink" ratios and minimal use of hierarchical headings are merely guiding ideas. My goal with Tufte CSS was not to say "this is how websites should look" but rather "here are some techniques we've found useful elsewhere; maybe you'll find them useful on the web" and "here is a sketch of implementing this set of ideas".

While I do think Tufte CSS could be a good starting point for a variety of webpages that want to communicate a point using text, tabular data, figures, and code, I don't think that websites should see Tufte CSS, or Tufte's print projects in general, as a design goal. Different projects, in whatever media, should present their information as best suits their particular circumstances.

Anyway, I apologize for giving the impression of cargo-culting. If there's any way I can change the wording in either the README or the demo doc to better reflect that this is not a design prescription, please let me know.

Re: Tufte CSS

#103

Post by daveliepmann »

mkozlows wrote: post #22
DaveWalk wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't have the meticulous shine of Tufte's books, but this is a straightfoward CSS guide. It's a starting point, don't you think? Butterick's implementation is more than a CSS guide though, right? I thought his design was to show off the power of Pollen[0], his online-book-publishing system. [0] http://pollenpub.com/

It's a starting point, but a starting point that directs users to fake italic, fake small-caps, mismatched mono text, inconsistent apostrophes, and ugly underlines. (Oh, and sidenotes and other margin content just disappears on a phone.) If you're going to start from a template, it at least shouldn't lead you astray in multiple ways.

We've fixed the fake italics, I think I've fixed the mono text (if you're talking about sizing), I've consistentified apostrophes, and changed how underlines are handled. Sidenotes are still a thorny issue (I'd appreciate any suggestions; we're discussing it in the GitHub Issues for the project) and small-caps are still on the to-fix list.

Re: Tufte CSS

#104

Post by tripzilch »

rjurney wrote: post #43

To the haters: this looks like something you could hand tweak to get a great result.

They're not haters. This is the type of discussion you should expect when discussing typography. It may seem like endless nit-picking, but it's the sum of nit-picking over all the tiny details that adds up to great typographical design.

I understand this type of thread doesn't really fit HN's "no gratuitous negativity" guideline, but IMO there's really no other way to constructively discuss typography. The whole field is made of attention to excruciatingly tiny details, but taken together, it adds up to great and beautiful design. It's one of the things I love about it.

Maybe note that none of the criticisms are entirely dismissive or unnecessarily harsh, but well-argumented, just about tiny details.

Re: Tufte CSS

#106

Post by unicornporn »

daveliepmann wrote: post #99
unicornporn wrote: post #29

I like the idea but turned away when I saw those ugly fake italic headings. Never italicize fonts that are missing italic type styles.

Sorry! Does this help? https://github.com/pyrocat101/tufte-css/commit/0a810a7d5f470...

No need to say sorry :) It does help, awesome!

Re: Tufte CSS

#107

Post by daveliepmann »

tripzilch wrote: post #105

Something wrong with the centering in my Firefox (v39, Linux) browser: http://i.imgur.com/8t95PQS.png Similar thing happened to the full-width image. I'll try to submit it to the Github.

Sorry for the trouble. Both of these should be fixed now. The second table style PR wasn't fully tested in FF.
Post reply on HN