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Top Programming Fonts

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Re: Top Programming Fonts

#11
post #8

In the past, we’ve had to decide between tiny monospace fonts or jagged edges. But today, modern operating systems do a great job of anti-aliasing, making monospace fonts look great at any size. It’s not 1990 anymore. Give your tired eyes a break and bump up that font size. No, thanks. All the anti-aliased screenshots in his post look blurry and some make me outright cringe. Also he missed my personal favorite: http:…

That's a good-looking font, but I personally need a big visual distinction, like a slash or a dot, between O's and 0's. (I do like the distinction between l's and 1's, though - lots of fonts screw that up.)

Re: Top Programming Fonts

#13
post #8

In the past, we’ve had to decide between tiny monospace fonts or jagged edges. But today, modern operating systems do a great job of anti-aliasing, making monospace fonts look great at any size. It’s not 1990 anymore. Give your tired eyes a break and bump up that font size. No, thanks. All the anti-aliased screenshots in his post look blurry and some make me outright cringe. Also he missed my personal favorite: http:…

That font makes me cringe. It reminds me of when the screen resolution is too narrow, widening all text.

Re: Top Programming Fonts

#14

ProFont - what other font is easily readable down to 6pt?

Andale Mono not only works great at small sizes, but also at bigger ones (14 & up) which ProFont does not (I have ProFontWindows which looks deformed at size 10, and annoyingly appears bolded at any bigger size than that).

Re: Top Programming Fonts

#18
post #16

Terminus is by far my favorite. I am disappointed it was not mentioned. http://fractal.csie.org/~eric/wiki/Terminus_font apt-get install xfonts-terminus

The only real alternative to Terminus is LispM font:

http://www.eurogaran.com/downloads/lispmfont/

A similar appearance! The CADR was dreamy in many ways, even its screen font.

Downside: only one size...

Re: Top Programming Fonts

#19
By my reckoning, six of the ten have major flaws that make them completely unacceptable for use as a programming font. Courier, Profont, Consolas, and Incosolata all have insufficient distinctions between 'l' (lowercase L) and '1' (one). Droid Sans Mono has an 'O' (uppercase O) that can pass for '0' (zero). Perhaps by virtue of the font size, Proggy has a lowercase L that can pass for a vertical bar at a glimpse. If you look closely, Proggy's lowercase L looks like a one -- this is less of an issue because it is visually distinct from Proggy's one glyph, but I still don't like it.
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