markboulton.co.uk— Learn it once and get it right. Your users with thank you - If you have ever typed anything, or plan to, this article is for you.
Aug 22, 2006View in Crawl 4
Good advice -- especially on the number of words and the space allocation. It really does make a difference. Thanks for sharing this one. Brain Based Business
No problem, I agree, the spacing of words is interesting. the leading in relation to the measure is something I didnt know either. Thanks Mikey for the link. 50cents looks like a great deal.Brock
Belayman is right, reversed type that is printed on a press usually suffers because the ink bleeds into the paper and spreads (not really smudging but I get what he means) - that's why you should increase the weight of your typeface - not the reverse as Mark Boulton instructs. However, if the type is not going to press than it really shouldn't matter - this might be what Mark is talking about since it's a web centric article.
wow, debating with you guys is like debating with a brick wall. have any of you read any of these comments (or even the article)? here are some quotes on what you retards say, what i said, and what the author is saying.author (and you dolts) claims he's addressing typography in general. i responded that he is not. he is clearly talking about web design, and the case studies have proven the exact opposite of what he's said."CSS and fluid? What is interesting here is fluid designs on the web. How can a Measure react to an increase and decrease in size." css fluid is impossible in traditional media. period. he's talking about the web, not typography in general.he refers to USERS (over and over again). as i stated above, USERS are not applicable for traditional media, and only applicable for computer usage. once again, he's referring to the web, and not traditional media, which means web design, not typography in general.on the whole topic of hanging punctuation he states "With hanging punctuation the flow of text on the left hand side is uninterrupted. The bullets, glyphs or numbers sit in the gutter to highlight the list. This representation of a list is more sophisticated visually and more legible." this is WRONG!!! people dont read in blocks of text. they will perceive the bullets like a border and ignore them altogether. this is what my paragraph example was all about. you can put bullets on the outside if you want but they will not be perceived as points. he also states "And before you say "Mark, you don't hang your lists on this site", I will be, soon. The comments list is hung, I just need time to hang the bulleted lists... I get to it ok?" this is a PERFECT example of him referring to web usage specifically (and his comments list is not hung at all). once again, web design, and not typography in general (and on this point he's just wrong)."Oh, and perhaps that’s my mistake about the headings - they aren’t supposed to be related to the text, just an indication as to which is correct or incorrect. Headlines should be aligned with the left hand column of text, only punctuation hangs into the gutter." headlines with the left hand column? maybe - many more readable designs do not do so. they'll reverse indent (look at the index of any textbook). punctuation in the gutter will be ignored entirely. punctuation in the gutter is just wrong (and a pain in the ass to code with the current system - that's the first time he's right)."A general good rule of thumb is 2-3 alphabets in length, or 52-78 characters (including spaces)." this applies to newspapers obviously in that they use the multiple column design. however it also obviously applies to web layout where he is justifying the stupid behavior of a single 3 inch wide column. on a screen that is 12+ inches wide, that means 9+ more inches of bulls**t (empty space, nav column, ads, whatever). this becomes an issue in color palettes where you have a huge glaring screen firing blank pixels in your eyeballs. to quote maddox, "Think about it: your monitor is not a piece of paper, no matter how hard you try to make it one. Staring at a white background while you read is like staring at a light bulb (don't believe me? Try turning off the lights next time you use a word processor). Would you stare at a light bulb for hours at a time? Not if you want to keep your vision." because the author limits space to such short sentence blocks, this gets into color palettes (for all that BLANK SPACE your words are not taking up).how you retards cannot think that his "reversing out" section is clearly under the heading of color palettes is well beyond me. somerandomnerd says he's not talkin about it at all ("You also keep talking about colour palettes- something the article doesn't mention once."), but then techobo says the exact opposite ("If you think that typography does not encompass color palettes, column width and bullet usage, I suggest researching the definition of typography.")as for case studies: <a class="user" href="http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=readability+memory+web+writing&btnG=Google+Search">http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=readability+memory+web+writing&btnG=Google+Search</a>microsoft wont formally release their ui findings (you might find them on an msdn blog though), but it's clearly evident on any article on microsoft.com and any of their software. why do you think onenote forces use of strict indented bulleting, and word/frontpage/outlook makes it a pain in the ass to not use strict indented bulleting? look at most new school textbooks and they also have dumped block pages replacing them with elementized bullets. as for printing with more ink, where are you (techobo) publishing and how many copies are you making? (in atlanta) when we were publishing brochures of 15k or less, it was a flat fee per item depending on different ranges of printing regardless of the ink used. but, when you start hitting higher counts (like some brochures I did for a MAJOR retailer, 500,000+), the amount of ink becomes an issue, and thus costs more. furthermore, when you're trying to get exact colors (which is necessary under trademark law to get trade dress and trademark registration on certain colors - like barbie's pink, blockbuster's blue/yellow, target's red, etc), you cannot use colored paper, and you have to prepare for bleed.so finally, he's clearly addressing web issues, not typography in general, and he's completely wrong.call me a jerk, but at least im right. i would love to put bullets and bbcode all over this to make it much more readable (bc apparently you asshats are not reading what i write, or even the article).and i wont be responding to this bc like i said, arguing with you guys is like arguing with a brick wall.
"A general good rule of thumb is 2-3 alphabets in length, or 52-78 characters (including spaces)." this applies to newspapers obviously in that they use the multiple column design.Umm, the next time you see a newspaper with 52-78 characters per line, you let me know. When working with multiple columns, 40-50 characters is a better average.- Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style (I know you don't like that book so, take that as you will)"microsoft wont formally release their ui findings"I guess you just shot yourself in the foot then eh? If they don't release their findings, it means you either work for Microsoft, have psychic powers, or you are making facts up... again."people dont read in blocks of text."...wow"and i wont be responding to this bc like i said, arguing with you guys is like arguing with a brick wall."I guess this is for the best. You can stop embarrassing yourself.
ellenweberAug 22, 2006
Good advice -- especially on the number of words and the space allocation. It really does make a difference. Thanks for sharing this one. Brain Based Business
sintaxiAug 23, 2006Submitter
No problem, I agree, the spacing of words is interesting. the leading in relation to the measure is something I didnt know either. Thanks Mikey for the link. 50cents looks like a great deal.Brock
matriculatedAug 23, 2006
Belayman is right, reversed type that is printed on a press usually suffers because the ink bleeds into the paper and spreads (not really smudging but I get what he means) - that's why you should increase the weight of your typeface - not the reverse as Mark Boulton instructs. However, if the type is not going to press than it really shouldn't matter - this might be what Mark is talking about since it's a web centric article.
androidiqAug 23, 2006
The NDDB rools for n00bs
wistarAug 23, 2006
I am in awe of the typographical sense they've used to compose "This Service Is Temporarily Unavailable."
krinthekuzAug 23, 2006
wow, debating with you guys is like debating with a brick wall. have any of you read any of these comments (or even the article)? here are some quotes on what you retards say, what i said, and what the author is saying.author (and you dolts) claims he's addressing typography in general. i responded that he is not. he is clearly talking about web design, and the case studies have proven the exact opposite of what he's said."CSS and fluid? What is interesting here is fluid designs on the web. How can a Measure react to an increase and decrease in size." css fluid is impossible in traditional media. period. he's talking about the web, not typography in general.he refers to USERS (over and over again). as i stated above, USERS are not applicable for traditional media, and only applicable for computer usage. once again, he's referring to the web, and not traditional media, which means web design, not typography in general.on the whole topic of hanging punctuation he states "With hanging punctuation the flow of text on the left hand side is uninterrupted. The bullets, glyphs or numbers sit in the gutter to highlight the list. This representation of a list is more sophisticated visually and more legible." this is WRONG!!! people dont read in blocks of text. they will perceive the bullets like a border and ignore them altogether. this is what my paragraph example was all about. you can put bullets on the outside if you want but they will not be perceived as points. he also states "And before you say "Mark, you don't hang your lists on this site", I will be, soon. The comments list is hung, I just need time to hang the bulleted lists... I get to it ok?" this is a PERFECT example of him referring to web usage specifically (and his comments list is not hung at all). once again, web design, and not typography in general (and on this point he's just wrong)."Oh, and perhaps that’s my mistake about the headings - they aren’t supposed to be related to the text, just an indication as to which is correct or incorrect. Headlines should be aligned with the left hand column of text, only punctuation hangs into the gutter." headlines with the left hand column? maybe - many more readable designs do not do so. they'll reverse indent (look at the index of any textbook). punctuation in the gutter will be ignored entirely. punctuation in the gutter is just wrong (and a pain in the ass to code with the current system - that's the first time he's right)."A general good rule of thumb is 2-3 alphabets in length, or 52-78 characters (including spaces)." this applies to newspapers obviously in that they use the multiple column design. however it also obviously applies to web layout where he is justifying the stupid behavior of a single 3 inch wide column. on a screen that is 12+ inches wide, that means 9+ more inches of bulls**t (empty space, nav column, ads, whatever). this becomes an issue in color palettes where you have a huge glaring screen firing blank pixels in your eyeballs. to quote maddox, "Think about it: your monitor is not a piece of paper, no matter how hard you try to make it one. Staring at a white background while you read is like staring at a light bulb (don't believe me? Try turning off the lights next time you use a word processor). Would you stare at a light bulb for hours at a time? Not if you want to keep your vision." because the author limits space to such short sentence blocks, this gets into color palettes (for all that BLANK SPACE your words are not taking up).how you retards cannot think that his "reversing out" section is clearly under the heading of color palettes is well beyond me. somerandomnerd says he's not talkin about it at all ("You also keep talking about colour palettes- something the article doesn't mention once."), but then techobo says the exact opposite ("If you think that typography does not encompass color palettes, column width and bullet usage, I suggest researching the definition of typography.")as for case studies: <a class="user" href="http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=readability+memory+web+writing&btnG=Google+Search">http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=readability+memory+web+writing&btnG=Google+Search</a>microsoft wont formally release their ui findings (you might find them on an msdn blog though), but it's clearly evident on any article on microsoft.com and any of their software. why do you think onenote forces use of strict indented bulleting, and word/frontpage/outlook makes it a pain in the ass to not use strict indented bulleting? look at most new school textbooks and they also have dumped block pages replacing them with elementized bullets. as for printing with more ink, where are you (techobo) publishing and how many copies are you making? (in atlanta) when we were publishing brochures of 15k or less, it was a flat fee per item depending on different ranges of printing regardless of the ink used. but, when you start hitting higher counts (like some brochures I did for a MAJOR retailer, 500,000+), the amount of ink becomes an issue, and thus costs more. furthermore, when you're trying to get exact colors (which is necessary under trademark law to get trade dress and trademark registration on certain colors - like barbie's pink, blockbuster's blue/yellow, target's red, etc), you cannot use colored paper, and you have to prepare for bleed.so finally, he's clearly addressing web issues, not typography in general, and he's completely wrong.call me a jerk, but at least im right. i would love to put bullets and bbcode all over this to make it much more readable (bc apparently you asshats are not reading what i write, or even the article).and i wont be responding to this bc like i said, arguing with you guys is like arguing with a brick wall.
acid2Aug 23, 2006
I would have loved to read this but... the site is down, and the digg mirror only copied the first page (naturally) - any other ideas?
techoboAug 24, 2006
"A general good rule of thumb is 2-3 alphabets in length, or 52-78 characters (including spaces)." this applies to newspapers obviously in that they use the multiple column design.Umm, the next time you see a newspaper with 52-78 characters per line, you let me know. When working with multiple columns, 40-50 characters is a better average.- Robert Bringhurst, The Elements of Typographic Style (I know you don't like that book so, take that as you will)"microsoft wont formally release their ui findings"I guess you just shot yourself in the foot then eh? If they don't release their findings, it means you either work for Microsoft, have psychic powers, or you are making facts up... again."people dont read in blocks of text."...wow"and i wont be responding to this bc like i said, arguing with you guys is like arguing with a brick wall."I guess this is for the best. You can stop embarrassing yourself.
sembetuAug 25, 2006
1 step to great typography:Get "The Elements of Typographic Style" by Robert Bringhurst. Read. Rinse. Repeat.