Week 7 articles

The Typofile Magazine article "The Best Faces for the Screen" is very old, no?

Of course, the limitations of low-res screens won't be with us forever. First, on-the-fly anti-aliasing (gray-scaling the type so it looks smoother) will be available on many systems, notably Windows 95. Done correctly, anti-aliasing allows more typefaces to look good at smaller sizes. Next, companies such as Xerox are already showing experimental flat screens with 300 dots per inch--the same as a laser printer. When that happens, choosing type for the screen will be little different than choosing it for paper.

Hmm...generally, the concepts in this article are good, but it would be more helpful to read something that addresses browsers and operating systems beyond Windows 95...since, as he says in the article, "When that happens, choosing type for the screen will be little different than choosing it for paper." So is that true now?

I liked "Think Outside the Font Box" because it put into writing things I've always thought about with fonts: how some fonts are very "artsy" and should only be used at large sizes in graphics, rather than as body text. I've always loved perusing font sites like Font Garden and downloading lots of funky, weird fonts...but I've always realized there was a distinction between those fonts and ones like Verdana and Arial, which are most definitely for body text and look pretty boring in large graphics. My personal favorite body font is Georgia...I use it all the time (like in this blog!).

"A Dao of Web Design" was very interesting. I agree with the concept that the web needs to diverge from its print design origins and "chart its own course," while still keeping the knowledge of print design of course. Print and the web are two very different mediums and require their own set of guidelines to be usable and successful. The article also had good tips about using percentages in CSS to control font size, and reminded me about the red/green color blindness issue we read about a few weeks back in a Jakob Neilsen article.

I love, love, love Dive into Accesibility. I am at a conference for work right now and only have time to skim the different sections, but I will definitely revisit this site when I get back. How cool!