5 ms·

One of the stated goals was "Be light" and yet the author managed to make a 1.2Mb page for what is just text. Another one is "Beautiful typography" and yet the

One of the stated goals was "Be light" and yet the author managed to make a 1.2Mb page for what is just text. Another one is "Beautiful typography" and yet there's a justified text without hyphens that creates some atrocious spacing. This site has incredibly good intentions and plenty of room for improvements.

kybernetikos 3y ago
I agree that the justified text isn't always creating good outcomes. This is particularly true with the margin notes. I like margin notes, but when there's a lot less horizontal space to play with, the justification can cause some really awkward spacing issues. All of this somewhat undercuts the sentence spacing argument. I think sentence spacing is interesting, and I agree that it should have had more support from css and html, but if your word spaces range from tiny to enormous and vary on each line, it's hard to even really see the sentence spacing.
- manuelmoreale 3y ago
  Yeah the side notes are especially painful and they become really hard to parse with those gaps. As for sentence spacing, I honestly don't understand what the goal is here. Especially because in this case the sentences are all wrapped in spans and then are not spaced at all. The only spacing is between p so why bother doing the whole sentence wrapping.
gwern 3y ago
Yeah, I highlighted those (and most of the other points in the comments here) last week in my critique: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36625742 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36625742 Presumably Dave just hasn't gotten around to it - that's how personal sites are, they fit only into the cracks of one's time-energy. No one to report a bug to but yourself...
- 50 3y ago
  re: your site, don't you think the standard for epigraphs (and quotes in general) should be non-italicized, i.e., left to how they were originally written, with or without emphasis?
  - gwern 3y ago
    Maybe, but if you don't italicize them, they risk looking a lot like blockquotes, and lack a good way of distinguishing the ascription/source. Italics are nice and often used for epigraphs, so it's not a weird choice.
- manuelmoreale 3y ago
  Personal sites are a tricky beast. Especially if you’re someone who’s obsessed with details. I spent way too much time on mine but to get to a point where I was happy it took me years. So I’m sure Dave will get there eventually.
beezlewax 3y ago
Yeh justified text reads horribly almost always online. It has it's place but doesn't work well here in my opinion.

kybernetikos 3y ago

I agree that the justified text isn't always creating good outcomes. This is particularly true with the margin notes. I like margin notes, but when there's a lot less horizontal space to play with, the justification can cause some really awkward spacing issues. All of this somewhat undercuts the sentence spacing argument. I think sentence spacing is interesting, and I agree that it should have had more support from css and html, but if your word spaces range from tiny to enormous and vary on each line, it's hard to even really see the sentence spacing.

manuelmoreale 3y ago
Yeah the side notes are especially painful and they become really hard to parse with those gaps. As for sentence spacing, I honestly don't understand what the goal is here. Especially because in this case the sentences are all wrapped in spans and then are not spaced at all. The only spacing is between p so why bother doing the whole sentence wrapping.

gwern 3y ago

Yeah, I highlighted those (and most of the other points in the comments here) last week in my critique: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36625742 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36625742 Presumably Dave just hasn't gotten around to it - that's how personal sites are, they fit only into the cracks of one's time-energy. No one to report a bug to but yourself...

50 3y ago
re: your site, don't you think the standard for epigraphs (and quotes in general) should be non-italicized, i.e., left to how they were originally written, with or without emphasis?
- gwern 3y ago
  Maybe, but if you don't italicize them, they risk looking a lot like blockquotes, and lack a good way of distinguishing the ascription/source. Italics are nice and often used for epigraphs, so it's not a weird choice.
manuelmoreale 3y ago
Personal sites are a tricky beast. Especially if you’re someone who’s obsessed with details. I spent way too much time on mine but to get to a point where I was happy it took me years. So I’m sure Dave will get there eventually.

beezlewax 3y ago

Yeh justified text reads horribly almost always online. It has it's place but doesn't work well here in my opinion.