UniLang

I remember making a thread 5-6 years ago where I suggested to change the font to one that has better Unicode coverage, particularly for Windows users. Trebuchet MS, the Windows font used, sucks for anything beyond European languages. Mandarin Chinese pinyin looks bad, and so does IPA or anything that tries to use an acute accent in a non-European way (at least we've got the [ipa ] tag for IPA).

People agreed that it should be changed but 5-6 years ago no one actually could. Times have changed and making changes to UniLang is a lot easier now. I could do it myself!

What would you guys like to have instead though? The current configuration of font-family is:
"Lucida Grande", "Trebuchet MS", Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;

I would be happy with Arial (I'm used to it from reading Wikipedia, in particular), but I would also be happy with Segoe UI, a perfectly fine font. Here is the font-family configuration I propose:
"Lucida Grande", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;

I made some screenshots comparing the four default Windows Unicode fonts that have at least some coverage of combining diacritics when used in a novel way (Lucida Sans Unicode's coverage is kind of bad in comparison with the other three though):
https://imgur.com/a/LH1WX

I am amused that one of my posts is in the picture.

I'm a sucker for Times New Roman.

vijayjohn wrote:I'm a sucker for Times New Roman.

>_>

>_>

What's wrong with Times New Roman?

vijayjohn wrote:What's wrong with Times New Roman?

It's just that, for mostly cultural reasons (I think), serif fonts like Times New Roman are usually considered a bad choice for web design (unless you make the text large). Apparently this is because sans-serif fonts used to look better than serif fonts back in the day before Windows Vista added significant font antialiasing by default.

Ser wrote:antialiasing

I just learned a new word.

I never really noticed anything wrong with the current font (since I don't use Windows), but considering this is probably an issue for most people around here, I'd be happy to go with Arial.

Yeah, it's definately a font issue. I just typed x̂ in Arial font and got: x̂
And this is what it looks like to me:

Best thing for websites is for them to just say font-family: sans or mono or serif depending on the needs, and leave users pick their favourite screen reading fonts.

So, what happened to changing the font/font family?

I'm just curious.

I propose Comic Sans

I vote for md0's idea with the sans family.

OK, I changed the font to the generic sans serif family, so the actual font you're going to see will depend on the browser you're using and your personal settings.

You might need to refresh your browser's cache before seeing any changes, though.

I can type ë́ and it shows up properly for me now! Yay! Thanks a ton, Luís!

Wow, the font looks really weird now. Not for actual posts, though; that still looks the same as ever for me.

EDIT: It's probably just because the language-specific(-ish ) forum names are written out in full.

I didn't even notice. Now nothing is cut out on main page!

I mean, I noticed the difference arrangement and spacing, but not the names.

EDIT: Huh, I just noticed that I need to have the "Let the page override your font selections" button turned off in order for the font to display correctly. Is there some remnant of the old specific font that is making this happen, or is it something else? Theoretically I shouldn't need to do that, should I?

I already cleared my cache and even cleared my cookies and history yesterday.

So, I went back and changed it to Arial, sans serif. We're still getting rid of the problematic Trebuchet font, but at the same time being more specific than simply letting the browser choose any sans serif font. Did that solve anything?

(as always, clear the cache to see the changes)

I'm on myfather's laptop (and he has vanilla settings on it) and it shows up find for me. It even has the "let website override font settings" thingy checked.

I cautiously say: I think we're good now. Thanks yet again, Luis!