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Programming Fonts – Test Drive

app.programmingfonts.org

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Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#71

Post by int_19h »

1kGarand wrote: post #30
Stratoscope wrote: post #26

It looks like these are all monospaced fonts. I realize that most programmers use monospaced fonts, but I personally find proportional fonts to be much more readable and pleasing to my eye. I would be really interested in a similar font comparison that included proportional fonts that are suitable for programming. Right now my favorite is Trebuchet MS. This renders beautifully on the high-DPI displays I use, and it h…

Verdana used to be my go to proportional font when I was doing Java. Helped with long variable names and long horizontal lines. My buddies thought I was nuts, but I found it very legible. These days my eyes are dimming, so I dislike skinny fonts. Now I use DejaVu Sans Mono in _bold_ exclusively. Every now and then when HN does a programming font post, I try out different ones, but I always end up going back to DejaVu…

If you like bold fonts, try Terminus bold at around 16pt.

Also, the old VGA font is surprisingly nice and legible. Can be had here:

https://int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts/fontlist/

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#72

Post by int_19h »

Stratoscope wrote: post #51
ww520 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious. How do you line things up?

> Curious. How do you line things up? I don't! :-) I spent many years lining things up. I would write code like this: foobar(firstArg, secondArg, thirdArg); (For the sake of discussion, assume that those arguments were too long to just put it all on one line, so you would naturally want to use multiple lines.) Then when I realized that 'foobar' wasn't such a good name, I had to re-align all the code: doTheRealThing(f…

Not a fan of proportional fonts for coding, but the point about refactoring affecting indentation is well worth reiterating. If you have ever dug through source control history, you know that there's value in not touching the lines unnecessarily. Unfortunately, most common coding styles that advocate lining things up do this wrong, such that a single rename can affect several times as many lines that are completely unrelated.

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#73

Post by Jaruzel »

raphlinus wrote: post #53
ChrisGranger wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consolas is a proprietary font, and this list includes only free and/or open source fonts. It does include the similar Inconsolata.

Though Inconsolata was inspired by Consolas, I wouldn't consider it all that similar. For example, the digits in Inconsolata are much closer to the Franklin Gothic model. Also, Consolas has excellent hinting for Windows, while Inconsolata was originally designed with no hinting at all. They're not drop-in replacements.

Seconded, Inconsolata at small sizes looks awful on Windows.

I'm surprised that so many of these 'programming' fonts do not have dotted or slashed zeros. For a programming font, that's a must-have requirement for me. I edited Droid Sans Mono, so that its zero had a slash, and now I use it as my go-to font for all my IDEs and terminals. However after browsing this lot, I'm tempted to give Go Font a try.

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#74

Post by klageveen »

me551ah wrote: post #44

I'm surprised that the list doesn't mention consolas. It ships default with visual studio and it's so good that I use it on arch Linux as my terminal font and with intellij. It was designed with programming in mind and has some nifty characteristics like a slash through zero. This list also misses out on 'operator mono' which is a well thought out font for programming.

Hi, I'm the author of programmingfonts.org. Operator Mono certainly is pretty. I always loved consolas on Windows (honestly, it's the only thing that rendered properly on Win7). That said, I can only include fonts that are freely available, or where the owner of the font allows me to (in the case of Input Mono). I have tried for a few others, but haven't been so lucky there. So, no proprietary or otherwise commercial fonts. I do try to feature them on the blog though.

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#75

Post by klageveen »

cpeterso wrote: post #45

I'd like to see an elimination tournament of these so you can two fonts head-to-head and vote for your preferred until you discover you favorite. Identifont is a similar system. It uses a twenty-questions style format to identify an unknown font. http://www.identifont.com/

That's a really cool idea. You know, the website is on GitHub, if anyone wants to contribute a PR I'm all ears ;)

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#76

Post by Jaruzel »

heyjudy wrote: post #57

I've tried dozens. Monaco or Source Code Pro You also have to try them in your terminal or editor, because on the web isn't the same experience.

Browsers tend to use their own inbuilt font rendering code, which can be different from the OS. I know for a fact that some of the fonts shown at app.programmingfonts.org do not render that well inside apps on Windows 10.

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#77

Post by Stratoscope »

Topolomancer wrote: post #60

This is interesting, but I would like a more 'guided' tour, maybe backed up by some usage data, as well as some statistics about readability and so on.

Now that is an interesting perspective!

It's hard for me to imagine that I would choose a font based on usage data and statistics: "25% more coders use Inconsolata than Verdana, and they suffer 3% less eyestrain as a result."

How would you even measure such a thing? A font that works well on a low-DPI display may not be the same one that looks great on a high-DPI display. And one person's eyes are not my eyes.

I look at a font, try using it in my work, and either I like or I don't like it. Even if I do like it, I will probably find some flaws in it and fix them in a font editor. Or maybe I don't and just live with it.

I always enjoy comparing notes with people about what fonts we like to use. But this seems like personal preference, not science.

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#78

Post by klageveen »

daxterspeed wrote: post #58

I think a lot of these fonts deserve a little blurb about their history and purpose. For example Liberation Mono (version 2+) and Cousine are fundamentally the same font available under the same SIL Open Font License https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation_fonts#Distribution Personally I use and recommend Liberation Mono / Cousine at 9pt / 12px. I've been using this font for years so it's just ended up what I'm the…

That's a good point. I usually have a little blurb like that on the blog, but I have been trying to integrate more info about each font into the test drive thing. There are lot's of "family relations" like that between fonts.

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#79

Post by Fellshard »

Stratoscope wrote: post #51
ww520 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious. How do you line things up?

> Curious. How do you line things up? I don't! :-) I spent many years lining things up. I would write code like this: foobar(firstArg, secondArg, thirdArg); (For the sake of discussion, assume that those arguments were too long to just put it all on one line, so you would naturally want to use multiple lines.) Then when I realized that 'foobar' wasn't such a good name, I had to re-align all the code: doTheRealThing(f…

This does force you into a style where lists of indented things require a new line - not necessarily bad, just an observable side effect, and can cause problems if you share a codebase that maintains a different style.

Re: Programming Fonts – Test Drive

#80

Post by klageveen »

decasteve wrote: post #40
angst wrote: post #15

Fira Mono link seems to be no longer served(redirects to general style guides page). Maybe you could link https://github.com/mozilla/Fira instead?

I believe this is a more recently updated link: https://github.com/bBoxType/FiraSans/

Good catch, I'll update the link. Both the Mozilla and the foundry's repo seem to have the same font, it kinda makes sense to link to the Mozilla one in this case.
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