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i don't know about on Mac or Linux, but on Windows the Safari font rendering is unacceptably ugly. it's fuzzy and blurry. it's the single reason i'm using Fir

by tokipin 18y ago

i don't know about on Mac or Linux, but on Windows the Safari font rendering is unacceptably ugly. it's fuzzy and blurry. it's the single reason i'm using Firefox instead right now i think Safari uses a custom font renderer, which on Windows is far worse than Windows' ClearType (which Firefox takes advantage of.) maybe Safari's rendering looks good on high res monitors, but on my 1280x1024 it looks like shit. it's almost as if it's doing three or four extra smoothing passes here's a couple side-by-side screenshots (note, there is some bug that makes the background of single-line text fields black): http://i277.photobucket.com/albums/kk63/temporaryupload/safari_ff1.png http://i277.photobucket.com/albums/kk63/temporaryupload/safa... http://i277.photobucket.com/albums/kk63/temporaryupload/safari_ff2.png http://i277.photobucket.com/albums/kk63/temporaryupload/safa... and yes, i messed around with the options. it doesn't matter what strength of font smoothing it's set to. it still looks fuzzy. in fact it looks worse on lower smoothing settings. maybe i'm missing something, and if so, i'm all ears. maybe i'm just experience a particular set of bugs :/ it's unfortunate because i like most of the rest of the package, especially the fast loading and JS.

gnaritas 18y ago
I use Safari on Windows because I think it renders fonts better than Windows normally does. The blurriness isn't a bug, it's a feature, it's rendering the font correctly as it was intended to be seen. Apple font rendering scales correctly when resized without suddenly getting darker or lighter like Windows fonts, which often look either bolded or too thin when resized. Apple and Microsoft have always disagreed on what's more important when rendering fonts, see http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/06/12.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/06/12.html for an explanation. It's no mistake, Apple does this on purpose, I wish Windows rendered fonts as well as Safari.
crescendo 18y ago
It's really a matter of taste—i.e. whether you prefer typographic purity or optimization for screen. The Safari fonts look better to me even in your comparison screenshots.
- tokipin 18y ago
  possibly. though i think the difference is significant enough that many people (like myself) will not use Safari for that single reason. you might argue that just as many people will use it because of that reason. but if it's true that people go with what they are used to, then those fonts are going to look plain blurry to most Windows users, and not much is going to sway them it would be nice if it had the option of using the standard Windows rendering. even without ClearType active it is distinctly better to me. i wonder how difficult that might be to arrange (i.e. is that part of the software open source?)

by tokipin 18y ago

gnaritas 18y ago

I use Safari on Windows because I think it renders fonts better than Windows normally does. The blurriness isn't a bug, it's a feature, it's rendering the font correctly as it was intended to be seen. Apple font rendering scales correctly when resized without suddenly getting darker or lighter like Windows fonts, which often look either bolded or too thin when resized. Apple and Microsoft have always disagreed on what's more important when rendering fonts, see http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/06/12.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/06/12.html for an explanation. It's no mistake, Apple does this on purpose, I wish Windows rendered fonts as well as Safari.

crescendo 18y ago

It's really a matter of taste—i.e. whether you prefer typographic purity or optimization for screen. The Safari fonts look better to me even in your comparison screenshots.

tokipin 18y ago
possibly. though i think the difference is significant enough that many people (like myself) will not use Safari for that single reason. you might argue that just as many people will use it because of that reason. but if it's true that people go with what they are used to, then those fonts are going to look plain blurry to most Windows users, and not much is going to sway them it would be nice if it had the option of using the standard Windows rendering. even without ClearType active it is distinctly better to me. i wonder how difficult that might be to arrange (i.e. is that part of the software open source?)