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No comic sans in httpd status pages

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41–50 of 89 posts

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#41
post #40
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SPJ about Comic Sans: > This is a very funny question, "Why use Comic Sans?" So, all my talks use Comic Sans and I frequently see remarks like 'Simon Peyton-Jones, great talk about Haskell but why did he use Comic Sans?' but nobody's ever been able to tell me what is wrong with it. It's a nice legible font, I like it. So until somebody explains to me ... Ah, I understand that it's meant to be a bit naff, but I don't…

Because it's difficult to read.

Are you saying that you think that Comic Sans is difficult to read?

(I'm prepared to believe you, but the main complaint I've ever heard is that it's "silly" or "frivolous" or... well, actually I haven't heard much beyond that.)

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#42
post #38
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they do it to make a point, they don't care about stuff being pretty, they care about it being sane and secure. If the only thing you complain about is a typeface then maybe they're doing their job right :)

Given that fonts are attack vectors, why style text at all?

The consideration of fonts as attack vectors is highly overplayed - the bytecode allowed in TTF in OTF fonts is pretty limited, while mistakes have certainly been made in FreeType and other implementations it's no worse than the JavaScript sandbox most people are already relying on in their browsers.

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#43

https://web.archive.org/web/20140625075722/http://www.libres... > This page scientifically designed to annoy web hipsters. Donate now to stop the Comic Sans and Blink Tags All the OpenBSD presentations I've read have been in Comic Sans. They really like that font :)

I actually like the font a lot.. it's readable, depending on size/resolution, and has a nice "unfinished" feel to it.

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#44
post #40
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SPJ about Comic Sans: > This is a very funny question, "Why use Comic Sans?" So, all my talks use Comic Sans and I frequently see remarks like 'Simon Peyton-Jones, great talk about Haskell but why did he use Comic Sans?' but nobody's ever been able to tell me what is wrong with it. It's a nice legible font, I like it. So until somebody explains to me ... Ah, I understand that it's meant to be a bit naff, but I don't…

Because it's difficult to read.

> it's difficult to read.

It's recommended for readers with dyslexia because the letter shapes vary so much. (I don't know if there's any research supporting that).

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#45
post #5

The hate for Comic Sans seemingly knows no bounds.

Since it seems fashionable to be outraged over something on the internet, I choose the unbridled and unfair hatred towards Comic Sans, the lemonade stand of typefaces. What kind of sick, evil bastards don't like lemonade stands? I'm also pretty pissed about Pluto getting demoted.

I think you've hit the nail on the head here. People like to feel part of a collective group, and the Internet's biggest collective group is outraged people. In this case, outraged nerds. We collectively 'agree' that outsiders (that is, idiots) use Comic Sans. Then we attack the style, rather than the substance, because they didn't know of the unwritten rules of our subculture.

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#46
post #39
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

r1.3 added blinking to the page. I love it!

> r1.3 added blinking to the page. ... because epileptics should suffer, apparently.

Hey, this is a real thing! will cause people with epilepsy difficulty, ranging from anguish to a full seizure.

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#48
post #38
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they do it to make a point, they don't care about stuff being pretty, they care about it being sane and secure. If the only thing you complain about is a typeface then maybe they're doing their job right :)

Given that fonts are attack vectors, why style text at all?

They aren't actually embedding the font, they are just setting a style in the css to use a particular system font, if present.

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#49
post #30
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since it was released in 5.8, I believe. OpenBSD projects tend to use Comic Sans as a matter of course as a ward against hipsters[1]. [1]: http://www.openbsd.org/papers/bsdcan14-libressl/mgp00025.htm...

The irony here is that using/liking something specifically because it makes you unusual, and wards off people who aren't like you, is exactly what hipster means. So OpenBSD are a bunch of hipsters.

Pretty sure they were security hipsters before it was cool. ;)

Re: No comic sans in httpd status pages

#50
This patch is a prime example of why I understand OpenBSD devs' frustration with newcomers. It takes several hours of lurking to get the general idea of what OpenBSD culture[1] is. And yet about once or twice a week there's someone new coming with some demand, backward idea or GPL evangelism, who gets aggressive when challenged. I'd flip the table every single time if I were one of the contributors.

[1] as long as you're not devoid of sense of humor, I guess, in which case there's no hoping

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