10 ms·
Mozilla's New Fira Typeface
- potch 13y agoDirect link to the specimen page: http://mozilla.github.io/Fira/ http://mozilla.github.io/Fira/
- mundizzle 13y agocool, they made the text contenteditable so you can see how things looks outside of their pre-canned text...
- ZeroGravitas 13y agoDoes anyone else think that the word "Firefox" looks odd in the italic versions?
- caiob 13y agoFira mono looks good.
- potch 13y agoI'm using it as my Sublime Text font, mostly as a trial. I'm digging it so far, in particular the funky '@'
- pygy_ 13y agoIndeed. I have two quibbles with it, which I've already submitted on Github: the position of the asterisk and the shape lof the lower case r (looks like a small caps i). Otherwise a very good font.
- mmgutz 13y agoIndeed. The curly brace needs to be little more pronounced. Other than that, it's a good alternative to Source Code Pro.
- bluedino 13y agoI always put new fixed-width fonts in iTerm to see how it looks. I cranked the vertical and horizontal spacing down, and it looks like I could have went another notch on the vertical. Fira is on the right. It doesn't look bad, but it's a little cramped and thin for what I like. http://imgur.com/GOi50xC http://imgur.com/GOi50xC
- nwienert 13y agoLetter spacing seems wide and overall kerning seems messy, but I don't know much about fonts. Here's a link with some actual screenshot examples: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/styleguide/products/firefox-os/typeface/ http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/styleguide/products/firefox-os/...
- skoob 13y agoIt's designed so that the different weights take approximately the same width, so that does mean that the lighter weights have larger tracking (ie spacing between letters) than the heavier weights.
- cypher543 13y agoI'm not a typography expert, so this looks like a hundred other fonts I've seen. Why does every OS need its own custom font?
- Detrus 13y agoBranding is one. They can't use a typeface another commercial OS used. Also type designers keep making new fonts with tiny differences from older fonts because the older fonts were already used a lot and don't look fresh. Just like programmers make new frameworks/libraries and using those is the cool thing to do.
- coldtea 13y ago>Branding is one. They can't use a typeface another commercial OS used. Well, if the license permits it they can.
- famousactress 13y agoOne thing that occurs to me is how "sticky" it might help make your product. Today I downloaded the new version of the JetBrains python IDE, and I'm a longtime SublimeText user. My first reaction was to be really uncomfortable (not surprising.. it's a pretty huge new tool for doing something I'm very familiar with)... however, I was suprised at how much comfort returned once I was seeing code in my familiar font again. I wonder if this is a useful tactic in making users of your platform continue to feel especially comfortable with it, by making other platforms feel particularly uncomfortable.
- SwellJoe 13y agoSeems like that would only be a positive thing for the market leader. Everybody else would be bringing more people over into a less comfortable experience. Market leaders don't want to lose people...new entrants primarily want to bring new people in. Firefox OS doesn't even really exist yet. Obviously, they need to bring new people in, and want people to be comfortable.
- miloshadzic 13y ago
- crazygringo 13y agoVery nice. It's awfully similar to Droid Sans, but the slightly lower x-height, and more more "playful" elements (like the gap in the lowercase 'g', the curve at the bottom of the lowercase 'l') make it bit more playful and legible. Above all, it feels more balanced, and accomplished, than Droid Sans. Excellent work.
- tern 13y agoYou know, I just don't think a humanist sans with a lot of character is the right choice for an operating system.
- tcdent 13y agoSo stick with Windows and let the Free Software hippies have a little fun. :)
- msutherl 13y agoI'm not a huge fan of Windows, but I must say that the new Microsoft-designed fonts (Cambria, Calibri, Corbel, Consolas) strike a great balance between neutrality and character for an OS.
- kps 13y agoI like Constantia, by John Hudson. It has become my go-to font for screen reading, since it manages an almost-oldstyle feel without falling apart at current resolutions. MS did commission some good work for the C-series.
- drivebyacct2 13y agoConstantia and Consolas are works of art, but Calibri has become about as grating to me as Comic Sans, as hyperbolic as that sounds.
- tux1968 13y agoHave to say that Consolas is the best monospaced font (that supports a large swath of Unicode) for my terminal emulator. I've always taken a rather dim view of non-functional niceties but have been swayed by just how damn nice the terminal looks while programming in Vim using Consolas. Well worth the purchase so that I could use it on Linux.
- fdb 13y agoIt's designed by Erik Spiekermann: https://twitter.com/espiekermann/status/382189483031949312 https://twitter.com/espiekermann/status/382189483031949312
- mortenjorck 13y agoTo anyone wondering, this is kind of the typographic equivalent to "by the way, this JS library was written by John Resig."
- ChikkaChiChi 13y agoWords I can understand, thanks!
- skoob 13y agoSpiekermann also designed FF Meta, which is the font used for the Mozilla and Firefox wordmarks ( http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/styleguide/communications/typefaces/ http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/styleguide/communications/typef... ). So, the similarities between Fira and Meta aren't coincidental.
- schrijver 13y agoIt makes me curious how they are going to deal with the issue tracker, pull requests etcetera… did they hire him also to follow up on them? I guess they don’t really count on accepting pull requests (seeing also how the font sources are not in the git).
- padenot 13y agoThis github repo is just here for convenience, to make it easy for developers. Source: https://twitter.com/potch/status/382611551145840640 https://twitter.com/potch/status/382611551145840640
- andmarios 13y agoInteresting. The character for greek k (kappa - κ ) is wrong though. The vertical line of the greek k doesn't rise above the rest of the character. It might seem small but it really strikes as ugly and wrong for anyone used to the language.
- saidajigumi 13y agoSince it's on Github, consider filing a new issue if someone hasn't gotten to it already: https://github.com/mozilla/Fira/issues https://github.com/mozilla/Fira/issues
- Avitas 13y agoAre the italic versions actually oblique (slanted)? In other words, is there a typographic standard for labeling typefaces italics and oblique? I seem to remember that there is a distinction.
- jamestnz 13y ago>is there a typographic standard for labeling typefaces italics and oblique As I recall it, oblique type uses the regular glyphs just slanted, whereas a 'true' italic typeface employs modified glyph versions having additional calligraphy- or cursive-like flourishes. In the following picture I've just made using Arial and Times, both fonts are claiming an 'italic' version. The Times one really is italic by the above definition, while the Arial one is 'oblique'. http://imgur.com/UVUZb5F http://imgur.com/UVUZb5F
- andmarios 13y agoThanks. Although obvious it totally escaped me. I just reported it. :)
- thomasjonas 13y agoI'm not sure about the hinting on the font, or maybe it's the rendering in the browser. It just doesn't seem that smooth.
- drivebyacct2 13y agoI think/hope it's the Firefox OS hinting, I've noticed the same with screenshots of the device.
- bluedino 13y agoIt's the serifs on the lowercase letters.
- stevewillows 13y agoThe dot on the lower case 'i' is so high! Outside of that, it looks alright, but still needs some work.
- josephlord 13y agoI think it is as much that the capitals are a little short but the i next to the capital F in Firefox is where it shows up. Will be interested to see if it bothers me in real use.
- driverdan 13y agoThat was the first thing I noticed. Lowercase i and j stand out due to the dot being too high. When the dot is taller than uppercase letters something is wrong.
- ksikka 13y agoNice font! The demo site could use taller lines. (increase line-height)
- dsego 13y agoI love the small g. Notice the differences between normal and italics (especially a, e, f, g, k). It's not just slanted, but curvier as well. Really makes it stand out.
- mikehotel 13y agoThe italics ampersand is especially stylized.
- nwh 13y agoNot a fan of it all, but massive congratulations for them including the different weights properly.
- tommmmmm 13y agoOverall I like it a lot, but I don't like that the sides of the capital M are so slanted. It sticks out a lot in the third screenshot: http://mozorg.cdn.mozilla.net/media/img/styleguide/products/firefoxos/typeface/example.png http://mozorg.cdn.mozilla.net/media/img/styleguide/products/...
- ChikkaChiChi 13y agoI like it but I tried it on two different monitors and it looks reddish? I'm guessing that's something to do with anti-aliasing but I haven't noticed it before...
- magg 13y agois this gonna be the default font on firefox desktop and mobile?
- zanny 13y agoHey look, its already in the AUR: https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/otf-fira-sans/ https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/otf-fira-sans/ https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/otf-fira-mono/ https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/otf-fira-mono/ https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ttf-fira-sans/ https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ttf-fira-sans/ Who needs firefox OS (I do have the in-browser emulator running, though), I just changed my system font to this. I'll have opinions after a days usage.
- d0m 13y agoEverything is in the AUR man ;)
- jammmuel 13y agoI'm not a fan. I just don't get why they adapted FF Meta. It's overly complex (the 'g' for example), and not a great display font. They should strive for simplicity, rather than individuality. Android's Roboto and iOS's Helvetica Neue achieve this, my personal preference being for for latter.
- devindotcom 13y agoYeah, the kink in the lowercase y, the gap in the g, and a few other touches don't scale down well IMHO. I am a big fan of the trend of designing free typefaces for general use like this, though.
- Samuel_Michon 13y agoHmm. Looks like FF Meta optimized for screens. Odd that Mozilla and Erik Spiekermann felt this justified having its own name. I made a quick side by side comparison between Fira and Meta Pro: http://i.imgur.com/Oo3yeYx.png http://i.imgur.com/Oo3yeYx.png
- shardling 13y agoThose look pretty different to me. I mean, very clearly related, but with tons of small changes. Like, the angle of almost every terminal is different, and in general the new typeface is much more vertical.
- Samuel_Michon 13y agoBut is it different enough to give it an entirely new name? Oh well.
- dubcanada 13y agoYes, as someone said below, what's the difference between most programming languages? Very small changes in the grand scheme of things, they mostly all have variables, classes, functions, etc. It's the same thing with fonts, they mostly all have the same sort of form, with variations. Put that font beside Arial and Helvetica and you can probably see similarities between them as well, yet they have a different name.
- Samuel_Michon 13y agoArial should have never come to be. The only reason it exists is because changing it a little and giving it a new name meant Monotype didn’t have to pay Linotype license fees. In this case, Spiekermann made both fonts.
- ZeroGravitas 13y agoArial was originally it's own font (Monotype Grotesque), but got squished to match Helvetica's metrics which is a good example of how fonts can be different and similar to each other.
- TheSwordsman 13y agoThis is a beautiful looking font and I could definitely see myself adopting it when typing papers. I'd love to use it in my terminal, but my only problem is the zero isn't dotted or slashed. My terminal font is stupid-small (I think 10pt), and the 0 and O looking similar has bitten me in code a few times. Well, shit...
- mindrunner 13y agoMan, that is exactly the first thing I did as well. Lets hope they release a 'mono' version soon
- sirodoht 13y agoThere is already one. And it has a 0 dotted.
- TheSwordsman 13y agoGood catch on the dotted zero. The spacing is weird, I'll give it a shot and see if I like it.
- ctiothy 13y agoI really don't like the lower case "r" in the monospace font. It looks almost like a small capital I (the serif portion on the upper left is almost equal in size to the right section of the arc). I like the rest of it, but the r is pretty distracting.
- wernah 13y agoI'm really curious as to why they would use images over font-face in the style guide examples http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/styleguide/products/firefox-os/typeface/ http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/styleguide/products/firefox-os/.... As a designer you want to see how the typeface performs in the wild, not snaps of it with some arbitrary aliasing. It's not a bad typeface, although the kerning on the light weight needs a lot of work. If you're wondering what I mean, look at the word 'quick'.
- nnash 13y ago>I'm really curious as to why they would use images over font-face in the style guide examples >style guide examples You just answered your own question
- wernah 13y agoCould you elaborate as to how? Examples aren't synonymous with rasterized images. They use font-face in the example column where they display Open Sans. It's not a big deal but I just didn't understand your response
- nnash 13y agoIt's mainly because the raster images are going to be more accurate than @font-face as they'll display properly amongst all browsers and OSes just like a PDF would. edit: Also the most obvious reason (which I forgot to mention) is that they are type specimens and type specimens are (AFAIK) always done in raster images.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- sillysaurus2 13y agoDoes anyone know how/why Helvetica wound up the most appealing font? Publishing content with Helvetica font seems to give the content an automatic, unconscious boost in credibility. Why is that? It seems to be a primal reaction rather than a learned behavior. Helvetica looks the best to me because it looks the best, not because someone else said so.
- grinich 13y agoI wouldn't say it's the most appealing. It's just the most simple, universal, sans-serif font. (Times is probably the serif equivalent.) Medium Helvetica is super legible and has great proportions. It gets out of the way and lets you concentrate on the content, which is why it's used for things like subway signs. It's kerning is balanced and works at large and small sizes. Helvetica is kind of like denim. It doesn't go out of style, but you can wear it hundreds of different ways. It's also Swiss. They generally make good stuff. :)
- jacobolus 13y agoHelvetica is great for logos, titles, headings, posters, etc., when you’re aiming for a specific (orderly/rigid/boxy/neutral/mid-to-late-20th-century, and generic, like corporate or government) kind of aesthetic. Helvetica is not a very readable typeface for body text – anything with more than a few words at a time – or anything small like labels on a map or diagram. This is because by design its letters have many extremely similar shapes which makes it harder to distinguish letters at a glance, and because it is designed not to flow. There are particular situations where Helvetica is appropriate, but it is massively overused in contexts where it is a poor choice. A humanist sans serif like this new Mozilla typeface is much better for general purpose use.
- Eduard 13y agoHm, currently no capital letters ''XYZ'' on the demo page.
- digitalzombie 13y agoThe zero and O is similar aw. Other wise it's pretty nice.
- gprasanth 13y agoObligatory link to xkcd - http://xkcd.com/927/ http://xkcd.com/927/
- quarterto 13y agoA font isn't a standard, it's an identity. "Oh, they're using a non-primary colour? I'll stick to RBY, thanks."
- quarterto 13y agoNice! I wonder if they deliberately made it close enough to FF Meta that the Firefox wordmark is recognisable?
- VeejayRampay 13y agoLooking forward to the next version of the typeface, Firaga.
- dutchbrit 13y agoNice font face, just a shame that Mozilla spends time making web fonts while their actual browser is crap at rendering them. Sa-a-aaad....
- MushCraze 13y agoI like it! Clarity, share, curve. Bold, italicize.
- antonpug 13y agoUgly as fuck. Can anyone make something that actually beats Helvetica Neue?
- alayne 13y agoAdrian Frutiger's typefaces are very good. Univers and Avenir in particular have nice neutral designs.
- cpeterso 13y agoThe typeface's original name was Feura: https://twitter.com/espiekermann/status/359353798663221248 https://twitter.com/espiekermann/status/359353798663221248 Why change from Feura to Fira? English-speakers pronounce it as “Fjura”, not “Foyra”. And Fjura sounds like Führer. Not good.