Current Events > It's stupid that they consider the lines at the top and bottom of an I serif.

(+) Yeah! (+)

It's not. It's how you draw the letter. Your sans serif font that just uses a slightly shorter lower case L in place of a capital I is just wrong and I don't understand why they have not fixed this over the many decades.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/b/b7e6325e.jpg

Reddit to the rescue

These fonts included in Word have correct capital I's:

Tahoma
Ebrima
Verdana

I do like Verdana.

There are some fonts that account for this and have a slightly stylized lower case L to differentiate it from the capital I.

Adwaita Sans is a good example of this and tbh a much better desktop font than Segoe on Windows and San Fransisco on macOS.

CRON posted...

There are some fonts that account for this and have a slightly stylized lower case L to differentiate it from the capital I.

I guess in one sense at least the two aren't near-identical anymore.

But it also low key triggers me harder that now they're mutilating a second letter to make up for their mutilation of the first instead of just fixing it.

When coding, simply use JetBrains Mono. But when handwriting, you also have to worry about 1 and sometimes even /.

Comic Sans still the best font

Not exactly pertinent to the topic, but anyone else a freak like me and put a horizontal line in their hand written "7"s and "z"s?

I sanned the serif

But I did not sans the deputy

NightRender posted...

Not exactly pertinent to the topic, but anyone else a freak like me and put a horizontal line in their hand written "7"s and "z"s?

I don't, but I think this is great for clarity TBH.

That letter and the sound it makes go all the way back to ancient Egypt. They drew it the same (a line up and down) and it made the same sound back then as well.

But the capital i just looking like an L, was handy for cheating with online names that were already taken. Like if Flint (FLint) was taken, you could be FIint (FIint) and no one would be the wiser

I'm pretty sure people have just extended serifs on serifed "I" into crossbars to distinguish it from somewhat similar glyphs, such as with small capital "", but the actual letter "I" does not have them and it is 100% correct to omit them.

NightRender posted...

Not exactly pertinent to the topic, but anyone else a freak like me and put a horizontal line in their hand written "7"s and "z"s?

I do this. I also take care to make the base of 2 have a slight squiggle, so it's less like a 1 or Z.

On the other hand, if I'm writing quickly, I omit unnecessary down-strokes (for example, u,n, and c are the same shape, rotated).

I mean GameFAQs seems to use a sans serif font for capital Is without any issue here.

Illinois still reads just fine, for instance.

K181 posted...

I mean GameFAQs seems to use a sans serif font for capital Is without any issue here.

Illinois still reads just fine, for instance.

Illinois only works in this font for people that already know the word.

EPR-radar posted...

Illinois only works in this font for people that already know the word.

If you don't already know the word, there's no font that can help you figure it out.

tankboy posted...

If you don't already know the word, there's no font that can help you figure it out.

Sure there is. All caps for example ILLINOIS. Someone given that who doesn't know the word can then look it up, unlike 'Illinois' where there are 8 possibilities because each of the first three letters can be either 'i' or 'L'.

we don't read letter-by-letter stop acting like it confuses u Illegal IllInoIs

EPR-radar posted...

Illinois only works in this font for people that already know the word.

The I is slightly shorter than the L's though. So if they're right next to each other like that, it's actually easier to differentiate, imo

Robot2600 posted...

we don't read letter-by-letter stop acting like it confuses u Illegal IllInoIs

I didn't say it confuses me. I said it's stupid.

Robot2600 posted...

we don't read letter-by-letter stop acting like it confuses u Illegal IllInoIs

Nobody calls me Leggle Lenny.

NoxObscuras posted...

The I is slightly shorter than the L's though. So if they're right next to each other like that, it's actually easier to differentiate, imo

It's still a bad font design. E.g., consider a proper name you've never seen before that has "I" or "l" in it, perhaps even a transliterated foreign name so you can't make a decent guess based on normal English spelling.

That really is ambiguous.

EPR-radar posted...

It's still a bad font design. E.g., consider a proper name you've never seen before that has "I" or "l" in it, perhaps even a transliterated foreign name so you can't make a decent guess based on normal English spelling.

That really is ambiguous.

*cries in Lida from My Hero Academia*

This only matters at all when its not in a word or name. In my experience, the only time Ive had issues is when I have to sign in an app on a TV and have to manually type my auto-generated password in with a shitty remote.

Fortunately, a decent password manager should have an option to Avoid ambiguous characters these days. It was only a problem for me because I have old passwords that I havent changed since that became an option.

Serifs have never looked good on screens, basically, and should only ever be used for print.