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layout post
date 2016-10-20
lastchange v008 + backup :fonts.md
file fonts-on-mac-os
title Fonts
excerpt You are what font you use
tags
apple
mac
setup
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Green Coffee Lover
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fonts.png {{ page.excerpt }} {% include l18n.html %} The object of this tutorial is provide deep but succinct commentary (without marketing generalizations) as we take a carefully crafted step-by-step hands-on tour. All on a single searcheable page. {% include whatever.html %} {% include _toc.html %}

Font files

For code editors on your desktop, you’re usually fine with either OTF (Open Type Format) or TTF (TrueType) fonts.

Fonts usually come with a license attached.

A font family usually shares the same design philosophy, making rendering in bold or italics visually cohesive and organized.

Monospace fonts popular among coders because they make the amount of whitespace clear, and improves alignment and readability. That reduces wasting time on bugs.

Monospace fonts is often designed with a slash or a dot through the number zero character also used in Scandanavian/Nordic languages.

Linux Fonts folder

On Kali and other Debian distributions, Truetype fonts are installed in folder /usr/share/fonts/truetype - so copy .ttf font files there.

Easy install via Homebrew Fonts

The easiest way to install free fonts is to use Homebrew Caskroom.

  1. First, do this command one time to configure:

    brew tap caskroom/fonts

    The response at time of writing:

    ==> Tapping caskroom/fonts

Cloning into '/usr/local/Homebrew/Library/Taps/caskroom/homebrew-fonts'... remote: Counting objects: 1140, done. remote: Compressing objects: 100% (677/677), done. remote: Total 1140 (delta 769), reused 527 (delta 459), pack-reused 0 Receiving objects: 100% (1140/1140), 210.54 KiB | 795.00 KiB/s, done. Resolving deltas: 100% (769/769), done. Tapped 0 formulae (1,156 files, 945.1KB)

  1. See the list of fonts at:

    https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask

  2. For each font you want installed. The most popular are:

    brew install --cask font-open-sans

    PROTIP: This draws from font-open-sans.rb at https://github.com/caskroom/homebrew-fonts/blob/master/Casks/font-open-sans.rb

    Note in the response that all the variants are installed:

    ==> Satisfying dependencies

==> Checking out https://github.com/google/fonts/trunk/apache/opensans ==> No checksum defined for Cask font-open-sans, skipping verification ==> Installing Cask font-open-sans ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-Bold.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/OpenSans- ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-BoldItalic.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/Ope ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-ExtraBold.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/Open ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-ExtraBoldItalic.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Font ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-Italic.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/OpenSan ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-Light.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/OpenSans ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-LightItalic.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/Op ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-Regular.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/OpenSa ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-Semibold.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts/OpenS ==> Moving Font 'OpenSans-SemiboldItalic.ttf' to '/Users/wilsonmar/Library/Fonts 🍺 font-open-sans was successfully installed!

Popular

According to a research study done by Hongkiat, the top 10 free and paid fonts mentioned by web and graphic designers were:

View fonts you have on Mac

Use Apple's Font Book app:

  1. In Finder, choose Go > Applications. Scroll to Font Book and double-click to open it.

    ( open "/Applications/Font Book.app" doesn't work )

    This program is described at https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201749

  2. Click "User".

  3. In Finder, drag the new font folder and drop it under the list of user fonts.

  4. Delete the font folder and zip file.

  5. PROTIP: Save fonts you download (rather than using Homebrew) so you can add them again on other machines.

Cross-platform Fonts

Open Sans on both Mac and Windows enable similar display.

The Light font is minimalistic.

Corporate Fonts

Many large enterprises prefer to use their own fonts as part of their "branding".

  • Microsoft
  • Salesforce
  • Apple's San Francisco font

See:

Elegant

For menus, invitations,

For invitations to baby showers:

Bitmap vs vector

There are two ways fonts are drawn - as bitmaps as static dots in a bitmap file or as vectors drawn dynamically by a program.

Vector fonts look better on Apple monitors (with 1080p HD and above) because they allow more efficient scaling.

When using old monitors with lower resolution below 720p, bitmap fonts are better because they are generally more legible at smaller sizes on low-resolution screens.

Mono-spaced Programming Fonts

I am not satisfied with standard fonts to display programming code.

Characters should be clear, easy to read, in cases of clashing ones such as 1, l, i or O, o, 0 easily distinguishable, differences between different kinds of brackets, quotes and parentheses should be clear, punctuation should be emphasized and they shouldn't break up words or sentences due to uneven character widths.

My main criteria is a narrow font so more characters fit on a line.

Vera Mono

Vera Mono is the standard monospaced font in Fedora Linux.

Todd McLeod's Favorite IDE Font video with install on Gogland.

From goo.gl/m51nNx for bitstream_vera_mono.zip

  • VeraMono.ttf
  • VeraMoBI.ttf - bold italics
  • VeraMoIt.ttf - Italics

Nunito

https://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/nunito

Fira

https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

Operator

For $99 per year for up to 250,000 page views per month,
https://www.typography.com/cloud/welcome/
is delivered via Akamai to provide each browser with exactly the right type of webfonts it needs.

For $299 just to use it on web pages or
For $599 to use on a single computer,
H&Co's Operator font is the new status symbol for developers, like having a Tesla.

Mono ScreenSmart render down to 9 pixels.

See the video about fixed width font design at
https://www.typography.com/blog/introducing-operator

Meslo LG Multi-Platform

Now one would think that Apple engineers are rather particular about fonts.

Since Snow Leopard, Menlo-Regular is the default font for Apple’s developer tools and the Terminal. (which is a customized Bitstream Vera Sans Mono).

But no.

One guy has nitpicky gripes with it:

  • The default vertical (line) spacing is just way too cramped

  • The horizontal baseline alignment of the asterisk is off

So he created a customized version of Apple’s font.

https://github.com/andreberg/Meslo-Font

His website has a "DZ" edition with dots inside zeros so no one can confuse them for upper case letter O.

https://github.com/andreberg/Meslo-Font/blob/master/dist/v1.2.1/Meslo%20LG%20v1.2.1.zip

Thanks to his work, we now have a good fixed-sized font that works across Mac and Windows.

https://github.com/andreberg/Meslo-Font/wiki/Using-Meslo-LG-with-the-Windows-Console

GoLang fonts

The font family, called Go, includes proportional- and fixed-width faces in normal, bold, and italic renderings.

https://blog.golang.org/go-fonts

Fira Code

Shell Prompt Font: Fira Code at https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

brew tap homebrew/cask-fonts
brew install --cask font-fira-code

The response at time of writing:

==> Downloading https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode/releases/download/5/Fira_Code
==> Downloading from https://github-production-release-asset-2e65be.s3.amazonaws
######################################################################## 100.0%
==> Verifying SHA-256 checksum for Cask 'font-fira-code'.
==> Installing Cask font-fira-code
==> Moving Font 'FiraCode-Bold.ttf' to '/Users/wilson_mar/Library/Fonts/FiraCode
==> Moving Font 'FiraCode-Light.ttf' to '/Users/wilson_mar/Library/Fonts/FiraCod
==> Moving Font 'FiraCode-Medium.ttf' to '/Users/wilson_mar/Library/Fonts/FiraCo
==> Moving Font 'FiraCode-Regular.ttf' to '/Users/wilson_mar/Library/Fonts/FiraC
==> Moving Font 'FiraCode-Retina.ttf' to '/Users/wilson_mar/Library/Fonts/FiraCo
==> Moving Font 'FiraCode-SemiBold.ttf' to '/Users/wilson_mar/Library/Fonts/Fira
🍺  font-fira-code was successfully installed!

Hack Fonts from GitHub

There are two to try:

https://github.com/andreberg/Meslo-Font

https://github.com/chrissimpkins/Hack

  1. Scroll down to click "Latest version", which for me was:

    https://github.com/chrissimpkins/Hack/releases/download/v2.020/Hack-v2_020-ttf.zip

  2. Unzip file: Hack-v2_020-ttf.zip to Hack-v2_020-ttf

  3. In Finder navigate to your user's Library folder.

  4. Drag and drop the unzipped fonts

Dylexia Fonts

Verdana is not only a casual, fun-looking font, but one that makes it easier to read for those with mild Dylexia. Dyslexia is one of the most prevalent learning disabilities, affecting the lives of around 15-20% of the world’s population.

Dyslexia-friendly fonts typically feature:

  • Simplified Letter Shapes: Reducing confusion between similar letters like "b" and "d"

  • Clear Letter Spacing: Preventing crowding and overlapping of letters

  • Prominent Ascenders and Descenders: Improving letter recognition

  • Uniform Letter Height: Reducing letter rotation or flipping

  • Open and Rounded Shapes: Enhancing letter distinction

  • Verdana is often regarded as one of the most dyslexia-friendly fonts due to its clear and simple letter shapes, generous spacing, and uniformity. This font was originally released in 1996 by Microsoft and has been a popular preference by many dyslexic readers.

  • Lexend is designed specifically to be highly readable and accessible for individuals with dyslexia. It incorporates features such as clear letter shapes, consistent spacing, and optimized legibility. At Recite Me we actually use the Lexend font for content that we produce and display on our website.

  • Lexie Readable is a font designed with dyslexia in mind, with non-symmetrical b and d, and the handwritten forms of a and g. Its marker-drawn feel is similar to Vincent Connare’s Comic Sans that children find easiest to read, but without the comic book associations. Lexie Regular & Bold are free to download for personal, educational and charity use.

  • OpenDyslexic has weighted bottoms, unique letter shapes.

    brew install --cask font-open-dyslexic-nerd-font

  • https://www.dyslexiefont.com Home Edition (or Education or Business).

    Dyslexie Regular LP172832.ttf

https://reciteme.com/us/news/dyslexia-friendly-fonts/

Anti-OCR fonts

For when you don't want your text to be recognized by Tesseract or other Optical Character Recognition (OCR) scanning software.

pdf ocrx extract text from PDF files.

VIDEO: ZXX fonts by Sang Mun, former NSA contractor, has 6 styles:

  • Sans
  • Bold
  • Camo has camoflouge
  • False puts the real letter inside larger false letters
  • Noise has dots
  • XCD puts a cross over letters. It’s the most successful.

Comic font to use in meme cartoons

Words in this cartoon meme, from World's Finest Comics #153 (1965), is changed to create various memes:

fonts-comic-bat-slap-320x314-61000

It doesn't look right if one of the standard fonts for word processing are used on comics such as this.

It's more appropriate to use Neale Davidson's Comic Book font is at https://www.dafont.com/comic-book.font

Instead of using a scan, which looks pixelated, Miles Goodhew at http://blog.m0les.com/2012/12/bat-slap-retro-vectored.html vectorized it into an SVG file using the Inkscape open-source drawing program.

Transparent Font

VIDEO: Within Google Slides, a workaround to create transparent font is to use font "Zilla Slab Highlight"

More on OSX

This is one of a series on Mac OSX:

{% include mac_links.html %}