You're overthinking it. I just sent a whole screen. On Sat, Jun 22, 2013 at 7:25 PM, Brandon Allbery wrote:

On Sat, Jun 22, 2013 at 9:49 PM, Michael Orlitzky wrote:

...

On 06/22/2013 01:28 PM, Mark Lentczner wrote:

...

3) Do not resize the terminal window

and

...

5) Take a screen shot of the whole terminal window

are mutually exclusive?

No, he wants a window shot, not a whole-screen shot.

What *is* inconsistent is that "do not resize" presumably take it at its natural size. Users of tiling window managers need not apply....

-- brandon s allbery kf8nh sine nomine associates allbery.b@gmail.com ballbery@sinenomine.net unix, openafs, kerberos, infrastructure, xmonad http://sinenomine.net

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On Mon, Jun 24, 2013 at 12:14 AM, Tobias Dammers wrote:

Well, there's only so many monospace fonts that are beautiful, reasonably unicode-complete, easy on the eyes, programming-friendly AND free (-ish).

Not really quite so true: I easily came across about a dozen that are readily available, and many systems have several of these pre-installed. (Though one's defiinition of Unicode complete might affect this). And yet, just four fonts make up over 75% of the sample - and two of those are essentially identical!

Also, the default for the most popular terminal emulators on Linux (e.g. xterm, rxvt) is actually a bitmap font.

Unclear if those are the most popular terminal emulators on linux any more. The screen shots I received say otherwise: I can only tell the terminal emulator in about half of them - but again only 15% have a bitmap font.

Controversial topic there, tread carefully ;) . Lots of folks are borderline militant when it comes to their terminal fonts, whether they're bitmapped or not.

Again, I'd say the sample doesn't bear that out. The samples with console fonts showed no signs of customization, and so one might infer that it is more likely that people are using them because they just came that way (and/or changing it is too difficult for the perceived benefit.)

Also, white-on-black vs. black-on-white seems to be an emotionally-charged question.

This seems true, and really baffles me. White (or green) on black makes sense on mono-chrome CRT devices with very low resolution: The lit pixels "bloom", and so a single pixel wide line of lit pixels is wider than a single pixel wide line of unlit pixels in a field of lit ones. Hence, small black characters on white (or green) would become anemic. Once you start using higher resolution, color CRT (which have less blooming), or LCDs (which have almost none), this reasoning makes no sense.

On Mon, Jun 24, 2013 at 04:09:22PM +0100, Tom Ellis wrote:

On Mon, Jun 24, 2013 at 08:02:17AM -0700, Mark Lentczner wrote:

...

And yet, just four fonts make up over 75% of the sample - and two of those are essentially identical!

Inconsolata and Consolas?

My bet: - Bitstream Vera Sans Mono - DejaVu Sans Mono - Inconsolata - Whatever the default terminal font is on OS X

...

Inconsolata and Consolas?

My bet:

- Bitstream Vera Sans Mono - DejaVu Sans Mono - Inconsolata - Whatever the default terminal font is on OS X

A bit of a tangent, but a while back I tried a bunch of those recommended programmer fonts, and I didn't like any of them better than the default OS X terminal font. I recall the problems were mostly that they tended to no longer fit 80 columns into my "3 tiled terminals" layout and some had oddities like underscore sticking out below the row or zero not being slashed, but then there was a whole family of things that I was just not used to. So the default was more readable simply because I'm used to it. Maybe all fonts are like that, once you get past the objective basic requirements. Also, more on topic, what's the ratio of dark fg bright bg to bright fg dark bg? Looking around at work, light-on-dark seems more common, to the point where usually I have to figure out how to disable the colorization people seem to like on internal tools because they tend to be unreadable on my dark-on-light terminals (and for whatever reason I can't stand garish syntax highlighting). But then looking around most people use the stock ubuntu terminal emulator with the default colors, so maybe they're only light-on-dark because they don't care enough to customize. Those same people seem equally happy to use the dark-on-light default in Eclipse. But I guess haskellers are less likely to stick with defaults, as demonstrated by their choice of language :) There's an interesting tension here between "pick anything reasonable and get used to it" vs. "actively search for your personal best", that actually applies to so many things in life...

(apologies for keeping this tangential topic alive for so long... but it is the cafe... and it is all for a good Haskell related cause...) The two fonts that are essentially identical are DejaVu Sans Mono and Menlo. Both derive from Vera Sans Mono, and in the ASCII range are different in only a few characters. Turns out that Monaco (older OSX default font) and Ubunutu Mono are also derivatives and very very similar, identical in many characters. So, perhaps Evan, the reason you didn't like any of them better than the default OS X terminal font is... they were basically the same as the default terminal font! If you want to try something different easily, try Andale Mono, which comes with OS X. If you like that, consider the very similar, but slightly more refined (and bolds better) Source Code Pro. As for basic color scheme: light-on-dark was represented 2:1 over dark-on-light. But share your suspicion that default settings in the stock terminal emulators may have a lot to do with this. Ah, the indomitable Mr. Parker, we meet again! While the other "console" fonts were nothing so much as an indiscriminate pile of plundered pixels from the trash can of crufty CRTs.... Your font was of such refined line and design that it clearly marked you as a man of distinction, wealth, fame, power, and fine scotch! A straight sided capital A, sporting a peaked top that actually comes to a point?!?!!! Well played! Game of Baccarat over martinis? — Mark On Mon, Jun 24, 2013 at 6:14 PM, Conrad Parker wrote:

On 24 June 2013 23:02, Mark Lentczner wrote:

...

Again, I'd say the sample doesn't bear that out. The samples with console fonts showed no signs of customization, and so one might infer that it is more likely that people are using them because they just came that way (and/or changing it is too difficult for the perceived benefit.)

Haha, you've succumbed to my adroit minimalism again, Mr. Lentczner. I have taken much pride in customizing my "console" font for readability, codeability and /pizzazz/. Next time you ask for a screenshot I shall rather send you a copy of my .Xdefaults file, pirate.

Conrad.

On 06/24/2013 06:18 AM, Mark Lentczner wrote:

Thanks all, I’ve got what I needed.

Finally, 15% seem to be using horrid bitmap console fonts. _How can you stand to look at them?!?!_ (Don't worry, you'll have Plush soon enough...) ​

I realize this is probably a bit tongue-in-cheek, but for my money nothing has beaten Terminus to date. In fact, few fonts even come close and most of them are bitmapped too. (It kind of sucks that it only has a few fixed sizes, but until we all get 600 dpi displays with paper-like contrast, it's probably staying as my font of choice. That, or radically improved hinting and and antialiasing.) Regards,