TCH-Thomas Posted December 29, 2003 Posted December 29, 2003 I have spent a while trying to figure out if I could use Comic sans as font in a menu but all sites when i search for "websafe fonts" on google, tells me different depending what browser and version the menu is intended for. Is there a trusted list i can find somewhere on what i can use and not? Also, congrats to Samantha (samrc) for getting first place when searching for the above words in google. -Thomas Quote
youneverknow Posted December 29, 2003 Posted December 29, 2003 Doing a quick search brought this page up that shows fonts safe for most browsers go to this link http://www.i4image.com/resources_wsfont.shtml Doug Quote
borfast Posted December 29, 2003 Posted December 29, 2003 Thomas, there's usually no such thing as "web safe fonts" because each operating system comes with its own set of fonts. Of course you can install more but when designing a web site, you can't count on your visitors to have installed that really nice font that came in that "100001 TrueType Fonts" CD and you love so much. So the trick is to specify alternatives. You specify a list of fonts the browser should look for and when someone visits your website, the visitor's browser will look for the first font in the list. If it finds it, it'll use it. Otherwise it will look for the second font in the list and so on. In CSS, to specify a font for the <body> tag, for example, you'd do it like this: body { font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; } This means the browser will look for Arial (usually found on Windows) first, then Helvetica (common on *nix systems) and if it doesn't find any of them, it will select the generic sans-serif font family configured on your machine. I found a couple of websites that look interesting (don't have time to read them all now, though). The first one tells you about the commonly foun fonts in various systems (ignore the <font> tag used there ): prestwood.com/community/webmaster/info/browser_safe_fonts.html The other one is this: www.724leads.com/web-safe-fonts.htm Hope this helps Quote
TCH-Thomas Posted December 29, 2003 Author Posted December 29, 2003 I know there are some fonts that are 90% good to use (arial, times, helvetica etc). The thing is that i dont think (havent peeked yet) alternative fonts can be specified or families in all web menus in which im building a menu. Will check that. Those site you mentioned, i ddint see them, so im off to view them now. Thanks everyone involved. -Thomas Quote
TCH-Thomas Posted December 29, 2003 Author Posted December 29, 2003 Did a quick reading on those 3 sites recommended. They are all mentioning some "safe" fonts, but all 3 are mentioning other fonts too, different on all. -Thomas Quote
GroovyFish Posted December 29, 2003 Posted December 29, 2003 I just stumbled on this today while on Visibone's website (www.visibone.com) http://www.visibone.com/font/FontResults.html They are running a Font Survey to get the % of fonts available (to browsers) on different OS's. I thought the results were pretty interesting. (You can take part in the automated font survey too by going here: http://www.visibone.com/font/tests.html) **Just so you know, the first font test takes a while** Quote
borfast Posted December 29, 2003 Posted December 29, 2003 Thomas, basically, the only safe way is to specify multiple similar (or as similar as possible) fonts, otherwise you never know how your site will look on your visitors' browsers. I don't know if the menus you're using allow to do that but I'm sure it does. If the fonts are specified somewhere, be it via CSS or the <font> tag, you can change it into a font list - you just have to look in the right place Quote
TCH-Rob Posted December 29, 2003 Posted December 29, 2003 What about having the font on your site and having the page reference it? I do that with my sig, wouldn't that work for an entire page. I guess I had never thought of a safe font and just made the page. Quote
TCH-Thomas Posted December 29, 2003 Author Posted December 29, 2003 To Raul: I did a check, the web menu program can handle generic fonts as serif etc. So now i just have to figure out what comic sans is To Tch-Rob: What about having the font on your site and having the page reference it? Sorry, I dont know what you mean, might be my english though. -Thomas Quote
hindixp Posted December 30, 2003 Posted December 30, 2003 Hi, just heard about your font issue. Apart from having a list of closest match in your css you can still come accross problems in displaying the text in desired font. one can safely embed fonts in their web documents using a FREE tool from microsoft. Its called WEFT (Web Embedding Fonts Tool). This tool will let you generate an EOT for your fonts which can be used to dynamically load Font data into visitors browser, It also limits the font object to be used only on your desired URL's as it binds the file to desired URL's WEFT supports I.E. Can be obtained freely from. WEFT Community Its quite simple to use, but if you come accross any problems just post your questions at WEFT community some one or i will try solve it. See ya, manu Quote
TCH-Thomas Posted December 30, 2003 Author Posted December 30, 2003 I have heard about that tool but always thought it was complicated to use and taking much of my serverspace etc. -Thomas Quote
hindixp Posted December 30, 2003 Posted December 30, 2003 Hi, in most cases where you are not having content in more than one language your eot's should be around 30kb's . i think most browsers/ISP wont slow the site for loading such sized files. Even in frustrating indian connectivity on 56k dial up such fonts get loaded in less than 5-10 seconds. See ya, manu Quote
borfast Posted December 30, 2003 Posted December 30, 2003 (edited) manu, how "FREE" is that tool? I mean, I understand it's free of charge but is it really free or will it bind you to use only M$ products (in this case, their browser)? I ask this because that would be an interesting tool to use for web sites but if it restricts the visitors to the M$ browser, then to me it's like I never even heard of it Edited December 30, 2003 by TCH-Raul Quote
KevinW Posted December 30, 2003 Posted December 30, 2003 Yes, that tool is for M$ users only. So, again, we go back to the concept that not everyone has every custom or fancy font on their PC, laptop, PocketPC, WebTV, or whatever. So it begs to suggest that one should try to use the standard, acceptable fonts. All the major web sites do. Yes, HTML code allows you to identify alternatives (Arial,Helvetica,Times) and that should be sued where at all possible. Finally, in Thomas's case, he is using CuteSITE Builder to generate his web site. And although CSB does use in its base code the HTML alternatives, if you go and select a specific font for a particular text or heading, it does not allow you to identify alternative fonts. Thomas, that may be a good "new feature" suggestion for you to submit to Globalscape! -kw Quote
TCH-Thomas Posted December 30, 2003 Author Posted December 30, 2003 Uhmmm, I came up with a good suggestion? Yehaa. By the way, since Kevin read this, Hows it going with my CSB webring problem (the me being suspended thing)? -Thomas Quote
Boojum Posted January 1, 2004 Posted January 1, 2004 For what it's worth--and it's probably ultraconservative of me--I divide my fonts into two categories: "times, times new roman, serif" (usually the default) and "arial, helvetica, sans-serif." As far as I know, this works fairly well across browsers and OSs, although it doesn't allow for a lot of latitude. Quote
surefire Posted January 2, 2004 Posted January 2, 2004 There's another alternative... I've recently done some server side coding with the GD library that comes with PHP (and is installed on servers at TCH) Rock Sign What this does, is takes a snippet of text and converts it into an image based on any true type font you desire. So, it has the advantage of being an image, but with all the flexibility of being generated by text.... so it can be updated VERY quickly. Even on the fly. I don't think this is a solution for ALL the text on a site... and it doesn't really address the orignial question but it's a nifty little trick. Quote
TCH-Rob Posted January 2, 2004 Posted January 2, 2004 Cant you do this $font_file = $_SERVER[DOCUMENT_ROOT]."/Therfont.ttf"; That isnt a font everybody has but I am using it in my sig file, I can see it and it isnt installed on my computer. Quote
Boojum Posted January 2, 2004 Posted January 2, 2004 While it is true that images using rarer fonts can be substituted for text in some contexts, I tend to feel that this incurs the drawbacks accompanying images, which multiply if one uses them extensively in place of text. Among other things, it will mean longer page load times--especially on slow internet connections like mine. Also, visitors with image viewing inactive in their browsers (and I believe this effectively describes search-engine spiders as well) will be unable to see the image/text. All this is why I strive to keep the requirements for viewing my pages as designed as simple as possible: I'd rather forgo a few bells and whistles than lose visitors without obscure fonts and the latest browsers. Quote
hindixp Posted January 6, 2004 Posted January 6, 2004 Hi, sorry for the delay in reply, actually having image for all the text is just not a very good idea, I think a major share of people today use MS I.E. 5x and above(look into stats of anysite). WEFT Tool is free. Anyone can use it. Only limitation which is also a good when you consider the strains a font designer takes to design a typeface is This tool will allow you embed font/s which have not restricted the Embedding of the font. This feature is set by font designer who may like people to use it dynamically, or would restrict and allow it only on legally purchased copies. It would be a good idea if people consider to use the font and eot's only when they have permisions to do so. See ya, prabudh Quote
KevinW Posted January 7, 2004 Posted January 7, 2004 but as was point out earlier, WEFT is only useful if working with Microsoft products, and only works with IE browser. Quote
hindixp Posted January 7, 2004 Posted January 7, 2004 Hi, ya you are right that works only iwth MS products, But if you have your own webserver one can go for more advanced font embedding technology which is Glyph Gate. More info can be obtained from GlyphGate Site See ya, manu Quote
surefire Posted January 7, 2004 Posted January 7, 2004 Just to clarify... My point was that if you wanted to have minor portions of your site, like banners or the titles of articles in blogs, that kinda thing,... if you wanted to have them in some esoteric font, then you can use server side code to dynamically create images on the fly so that your weird font works with all browsers. Certainly this is not a solution for the majority of your text. Quote
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