I use twelve point Times New Roman in OpenOffice to write stories. My problem is that punctuation marks such as commas and full stops are difficult to discern against the biological splatter (ewwwww!) on my screen. Can anyone suggest an alternative twelve point font which is broadly similar to Times New Roman but has more obtrusive punctuation marks?
(It will make no difference to my stories on SOL because I convert to plain text before uploading.)
Thanks,
AJ
My eyesight is not great.
I find Cambria easy to discern, particularly for noticing the differences between commas/full stops and semi-colons/colons.
Thanks for the suggestion, but my version of OO doesn't list Cambria as an option :(
OO has just flagged 'tentacular' as an error, instead recommending 'lenticular' ;)
AJ
my version of OO doesn't list Cambria as an option :(
I googled it and found this site where you can download Cambria for free:
https://www.wfonts.com/font/cambria
Thanks for the suggestion, but my version of OO doesn't list Cambria as an option :(
@Ernest Bywater
Thanks. I'm currently giving it a try.
That particular version of Palantino, was widely distributed to anyone owning Microsoft products, but is actually a FREE version of the file that can be downloaded (or freely traded) with others.
If you can't find it, ask one of us. There are also LOTS of other Palantino alternatives, which are also free (the font dates from 1948), so you're free to use it however you'd like.
OO has just flagged 'tentacular' as an error, instead recommending 'lenticular' ;)
Actually I rather like the imagery of 'the insidious lenticular influence of American aid dollars'.
Only Chrome doesn't like 'lenticular' and wants me to use 'ventricular' instead ;)
AJ
I use Palatino Linotype because it has a nice white space around everything.
I use Palatino Linotype because it has a nice white space around everything.
That's nice. I hate those fonts with spaces which are hardly even there and f's which swallow up punctuation marks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambria_(typeface)
The other fonts in the same group are Calibri, Candara, Consolas, Constantia and Corbel.
Well, since it's on screen and larger type doesn't cost any more, I use 18 point Arial.
I write in MS Weird -- sometimes in Word Pervert -- When I put it through the software's proofreading, they find the difference between periods and commas -- or full and half stops if you're on the right side of the pond. That's not something my eyes ever find easily.
The Liberation* fonts of LibreOffice are metrically compatible with the Times New Roman fonts.
In LibreOffice Carlito == Calibri and Caladea == Cambria.
If you're a Linux user you could install the ms font pack:
sudo apt-get install ttf-mscorefonts-installer.
I am a huge fan of the entire Formata family of fonts.
In my before times as a worker in the working world, I changed the font of everything I designed for the company to the Formata family. When they asked why did I change it, I said, "It looks better now, and no one else is using this in our industry."
I was soon let go but I happened across some new work from that company a couple of years later, and they were still using Formata and had even changed their company logo font to Formata.
I had a nice laugh cause I didn't like being there anyway.
I like DPCustomMono for proofreading, and I found it works well for writing.
It helps, when suggesting fonts, if you can detail whether these fonts come from, and whether they're free, default of paid fonts (though I seriously doubt anyone here—besides me—that is, who actually pays for their fonts).
While trying to find the font in question, I came across this (from multiple font websites):
A page on the Distributed Proofreaders project advises people who are trying to find typos in scanned and OCR'ed texts to try DPCustomMono, a font specifically designed to make it easy to catch common OCR errors. Distributed Proofreaders are volunteers who check out a page or more of scanned text from the Project Gutenberg archives and check it for typos, improving the quality of the text. DPCustomMono's characters are designed to maximize the difference between ones, lower-case ells, and upper-case eyes, as well as other lookalike glyphs.
And yes, DP Proofreading (the owners of the font) allow its free use and distribution, as long as you include their language when distributing it to other sites (i.e. posting it online).
I think I'll give this one a try. Now i just have to figure out how to get cranky old Word how to use a different font on their Review tab than they do on their other tabs. :(
I've been doing distributed proofreading of french texts for 17 years now and I was still not aware that I could benefit from installing that font! I feel pretty stupid, It's in the faq, it's my default font, I see it's in the css as DPCustomMono2. But I forgot to install it...
https://www.pgdp.net/c/faq/font_sample.php
https://www.pgdp.net/c/faq/DPCustomMono2.ttf
I've been doing distributed proofreading of french texts for 17 years now and I was still not aware that I could benefit from installing that font! I feel pretty stupid, It's in the faq, it's my default font, I see it's in the css as DPCustomMono2. But I forgot to install it...
Been there and done that. Often, although we kind see things in the distance which no one else seems to notice, but what staring us right in the face is utterly invisible. 'D
but has more obtrusive punctuation marks?
I used to use Book Antique, which like Times New Roman is a serif font that appears larger than Times New Roman. That is probably due to looser kerning and slightly wider characters.
I used to use Book Antique, which like Times New Roman is a serif font that appears larger than Times New Roman. That is probably due to looser kerning and slightly wider characters.
I've always liked that one as well.
