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  3. What is the best font for programming?

What is the best font for programming?

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  • V Vikram A Punathambekar

    Consolas, and I know I'm going out on a limb here, but I use 15 pt.

    Turns out I use 14 pt.

    (My monitor is only 17 inches, and I use 1280x1024).

    Cheers, Vikram. (Cracked not one CCC, but two!)

    modified on Friday, November 27, 2009 2:36 AM

    C Offline
    C Offline
    CaptainSeeSharp
    wrote on last edited by
    #21

    Vikram A Punathambekar wrote:

    Consolas, and I know I'm going out on a limb here, but I use 15 pt. (My monitor is only 17 inches, and I use 1280x1024).

    Thats crazy. I think I'm stuck on Terminal 10pt. It isn't perfect, but other fonts just don't have that special look to them.

    Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

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    • V Vikram A Punathambekar

      Consolas, and I know I'm going out on a limb here, but I use 15 pt.

      Turns out I use 14 pt.

      (My monitor is only 17 inches, and I use 1280x1024).

      Cheers, Vikram. (Cracked not one CCC, but two!)

      modified on Friday, November 27, 2009 2:36 AM

      J Offline
      J Offline
      Judah Gabriel Himango
      wrote on last edited by
      #22

      Wow. I use Consolas 12pt here. I thought that was big.

      Religiously blogging on the intarwebs since the early 21st century: Kineti L'Tziyon Judah Himango

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      • C Christian Graus

        He's an idiot. And he's taken to creating you tube videos that slander me. "I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming. " This is ridiculous, I am sorry. The font that suits you, is a personal choice. There are no fonts created FOR programming, or universally the BEST for programming.

        Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.

        V Offline
        V Offline
        Vikram A Punathambekar
        wrote on last edited by
        #23

        Christian Graus wrote:

        And he's taken to creating you tube videos that slander me.

        Maybe if you hadn't indulged him all these years, he would have just ignored you? Besides, this is your response - ridiculing his questions?

        Christian Graus wrote:

        The font that suits you, is a personal choice.

        Yes, and he wants to know which ones people use so he can try them and pick one he likes. Do you also ridicule the people who ask for other people's favourite music players, text editors, etc?

        Christian Graus wrote:

        There are no fonts created FOR programming, or universally the BEST for programming.

        As above. Also, I'd say Consolas was created for programming.

        Christian Graus wrote:

        He's an idiot.

        On that we agree. :)

        Cheers, Vikram. (Cracked not one CCC, but two!)

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        • J Judah Gabriel Himango

          Wow. I use Consolas 12pt here. I thought that was big.

          Religiously blogging on the intarwebs since the early 21st century: Kineti L'Tziyon Judah Himango

          V Offline
          V Offline
          Vikram A Punathambekar
          wrote on last edited by
          #24

          Screen size and resolution?

          Cheers, Vikram. (Cracked not one CCC, but two!)

          J 1 Reply Last reply
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          • J Judah Gabriel Himango

            Wow. I use Consolas 12pt here. I thought that was big.

            Religiously blogging on the intarwebs since the early 21st century: Kineti L'Tziyon Judah Himango

            S Offline
            S Offline
            Shog9 0
            wrote on last edited by
            #25

            Judah Himango wrote:

            I thought that was big.

            It is! When I use Consolas, I use 10pt. I prefer 10.5pt, but that doesn't seem to work in VS. Consolas is a very bulky font. Pretty enough, at larger sizes, and with good anti-aliasing... But bulky.

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            • S Shog9 0

              Judah Himango wrote:

              I thought that was big.

              It is! When I use Consolas, I use 10pt. I prefer 10.5pt, but that doesn't seem to work in VS. Consolas is a very bulky font. Pretty enough, at larger sizes, and with good anti-aliasing... But bulky.

              M Offline
              M Offline
              Member 96
              wrote on last edited by
              #26

              Ahhh..screw it. I'm going to buy stock in monitor manufacturers and laugh all the way to the bank at you fools. ;)


              "Creating your own blog is about as easy as creating your own urine, and you're about as likely to find someone else interested in it." -- Lore Sjöberg

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              • C Christian Graus

                He's an idiot. And he's taken to creating you tube videos that slander me. "I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming. " This is ridiculous, I am sorry. The font that suits you, is a personal choice. There are no fonts created FOR programming, or universally the BEST for programming.

                Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.

                R Offline
                R Offline
                Rajesh R Subramanian
                wrote on last edited by
                #27

                Christian Graus wrote:

                There are no fonts created FOR programming

                http://www.proggyfonts.com/[^]

                “Follow your bliss.” – Joseph Campbell

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                • C CaptainSeeSharp

                  I've just rediscovered the beauty of color on black for programming environment. More information can be expressed with this type of color scheme. I like how numbers, strings, operators, identifiers all have a unique color that makes things much easier to sort through. The massive reduction of strain on the eyes is good also. Now I am looking for the best font to go with it. For those who customize their programming environment, what font do you use? What color scheme do you use? What is the best? I kind of like fonts that remind me of programming in DOS, however fixedsys and terminal are too big. I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming.

                  Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

                  R Offline
                  R Offline
                  Rajesh R Subramanian
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #28

                  Take a look at http://www.proggyfonts.com/[^]. The site has many good fonts for programming. I use Consolas though.

                  “Follow your bliss.” – Joseph Campbell

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                  • C CaptainSeeSharp

                    I've just rediscovered the beauty of color on black for programming environment. More information can be expressed with this type of color scheme. I like how numbers, strings, operators, identifiers all have a unique color that makes things much easier to sort through. The massive reduction of strain on the eyes is good also. Now I am looking for the best font to go with it. For those who customize their programming environment, what font do you use? What color scheme do you use? What is the best? I kind of like fonts that remind me of programming in DOS, however fixedsys and terminal are too big. I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming.

                    Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

                    J Offline
                    J Offline
                    Jamie Nordmeyer
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #29

                    I've got both Visual Studio and SQL Server Management Studio set to Consonas. It's a very easy to look at font, and as weird as it sounds, with ClearType enabled, it's really rather nice to look at. I've actually been more productive using this font.

                    Jamie Nordmeyer
                    Portland, Oregon, USA
                    http://www.feralcodemonkies.com

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                    • C CaptainSeeSharp

                      I've just rediscovered the beauty of color on black for programming environment. More information can be expressed with this type of color scheme. I like how numbers, strings, operators, identifiers all have a unique color that makes things much easier to sort through. The massive reduction of strain on the eyes is good also. Now I am looking for the best font to go with it. For those who customize their programming environment, what font do you use? What color scheme do you use? What is the best? I kind of like fonts that remind me of programming in DOS, however fixedsys and terminal are too big. I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming.

                      Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

                      B Offline
                      B Offline
                      BillWoodruff
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #30

                      Graham Shanks' comment linked to Hans' comprehensive survey : [^] "Font Survey: 42 of the Best Monospaced Programming Fonts" By Hans Dietrich A masterful job of illustrating and intelligently discussing the pros and cons of various fonts designed for programming. Which has undergone several revisions, been updated as recently as the end of September this year. So, I'd like to join in with Graham in "applause" for a great article ! imho Hans' article, along with the link to proggyfonts provided by Rajesh, has everything you need to make a choice suitable for your eyes and your style. < aside : I personally find colored text on a black background difficult to read in all situations, perhaps one reason I find so many of the WPF interfaces in the style I refer to as "vampire funeral" very difficult to use ... but I have the same problem with what I refer to as the "bleached-out aqua" WPF interface themes. probably just my old eyes > best, Bill

                      "Many : not conversant with mathematical studies, imagine that because it [the Analytical Engine] is to give results in numerical notation, its processes must consequently be arithmetical, numerical, rather than algebraical and analytical. This is an error. The engine can arrange and combine numerical quantities as if they were letters or any other general symbols; and it fact it might bring out its results in algebraical notation, were provisions made accordingly." Ada, Countess Lovelace, 1844

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                      • C CaptainSeeSharp

                        I've just rediscovered the beauty of color on black for programming environment. More information can be expressed with this type of color scheme. I like how numbers, strings, operators, identifiers all have a unique color that makes things much easier to sort through. The massive reduction of strain on the eyes is good also. Now I am looking for the best font to go with it. For those who customize their programming environment, what font do you use? What color scheme do you use? What is the best? I kind of like fonts that remind me of programming in DOS, however fixedsys and terminal are too big. I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming.

                        Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

                        H Offline
                        H Offline
                        Hans Dietrich
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #31

                        If you like programming on a dark background, check out Tomas Restrepo's VS2008 color schemes: http://winterdom.com/2007/11/vs2008colorschemes [update] And my friend just reminded me of more color schemes here: http://www.hanselman.com/blog/VisualStudioProgrammerThemesGallery.aspx

                        Best wishes, Hans


                        [Hans Dietrich Software]

                        modified on Friday, November 27, 2009 2:24 AM

                        V 1 Reply Last reply
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                        • C CaptainSeeSharp

                          I've just rediscovered the beauty of color on black for programming environment. More information can be expressed with this type of color scheme. I like how numbers, strings, operators, identifiers all have a unique color that makes things much easier to sort through. The massive reduction of strain on the eyes is good also. Now I am looking for the best font to go with it. For those who customize their programming environment, what font do you use? What color scheme do you use? What is the best? I kind of like fonts that remind me of programming in DOS, however fixedsys and terminal are too big. I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming.

                          Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

                          B Offline
                          B Offline
                          Brady Kelly
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #32

                          All my elements have a unique colour as well, still on a white background, but that's beside the point. The best programming font ever is Consolas.

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                          • C Christian Graus

                            He's an idiot. And he's taken to creating you tube videos that slander me. "I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming. " This is ridiculous, I am sorry. The font that suits you, is a personal choice. There are no fonts created FOR programming, or universally the BEST for programming.

                            Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.

                            B Offline
                            B Offline
                            Brady Kelly
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #33

                            Many fonts have been created for programming.

                            1 Reply Last reply
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                            • C CaptainSeeSharp

                              I've just rediscovered the beauty of color on black for programming environment. More information can be expressed with this type of color scheme. I like how numbers, strings, operators, identifiers all have a unique color that makes things much easier to sort through. The massive reduction of strain on the eyes is good also. Now I am looking for the best font to go with it. For those who customize their programming environment, what font do you use? What color scheme do you use? What is the best? I kind of like fonts that remind me of programming in DOS, however fixedsys and terminal are too big. I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming.

                              Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

                              B Offline
                              B Offline
                              Brady Kelly
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #34

                              Jeff Atwood has quite a few blog posts, if you Google for them on fonts and colour schemes. Here is one with some examples of good coding fonts (and one very bad example). http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000969.html[^]

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                              • S Shog9 0

                                I use multiple fonts. Italic comments and bold operators make code faster to read. And I believe strongly in reading a lot of code as quickly as possible... As for which fonts... Pick something that looks good to you. Why on earth would you trust someone else's subjective opinions over what your own eyes tell you? Personally, I dislike using fonts where l looks like 1 or 0 looks like O, but YMMV...

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                                B Offline
                                Brady Kelly
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #35

                                Shog9 wrote:

                                Italic comments

                                Thanks. I had that enabled some time, then completely forgot about it. Switching it on right now. Maybe not. It's not a standard option and not easy to kludge.


                                Last modified: 46mins after originally posted --

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                                • L Lost User

                                  I just use the visual studio option that makes it look and feel like version 6. My work is mostly linux there days and more and more I'm using vi to edit and just building in VS occasionally to make sure it still builds with their crappy c++ compiler.

                                  Movember![^]

                                  B Offline
                                  B Offline
                                  Brady Kelly
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #36

                                  Josh Gray wrote:

                                  I just use the visual studio option that makes it look and feel like version 6.

                                  Eeew!

                                  1 Reply Last reply
                                  0
                                  • H Hans Dietrich

                                    If you like programming on a dark background, check out Tomas Restrepo's VS2008 color schemes: http://winterdom.com/2007/11/vs2008colorschemes [update] And my friend just reminded me of more color schemes here: http://www.hanselman.com/blog/VisualStudioProgrammerThemesGallery.aspx

                                    Best wishes, Hans


                                    [Hans Dietrich Software]

                                    modified on Friday, November 27, 2009 2:24 AM

                                    V Offline
                                    V Offline
                                    Vikram A Punathambekar
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #37

                                    Nice, long-forgotten links, Hans :) I've been using a heavily-modified version of Zenburn for 2+ years now, in both VS and SQL Server Management Studio. Very pleasing on the eyes.

                                    Cheers, Vikram. (Cracked not one CCC, but two!)

                                    1 Reply Last reply
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                                    • C Christian Graus

                                      Well, sure. BUT, there's a ton of fonts out there, which would satisfy that problem. Just setting the colour scheme and font size, will do that. To suggest there's an optimal programming font, is the height of ignorance.

                                      Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.

                                      J Offline
                                      J Offline
                                      Johann Gerell
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #38

                                      Well, that lies in the eyes of the beholder, and so on, yada-yada.

                                      Christian Graus wrote:

                                      To suggest there's an optimal programming font, is the height of ignorance.

                                      Isn't that more ignorant? ;)

                                      -- Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time - Bertrand Russel

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                                      0
                                      • C Christian Graus

                                        He's an idiot. And he's taken to creating you tube videos that slander me. "I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming. " This is ridiculous, I am sorry. The font that suits you, is a personal choice. There are no fonts created FOR programming, or universally the BEST for programming.

                                        Christian Graus Driven to the arms of OSX by Vista. Read my blog to find out how I've worked around bugs in Microsoft tools and frameworks.

                                        A Offline
                                        A Offline
                                        AspDotNetDev
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #39

                                        Christian Graus wrote:

                                        you tube videos that slander me

                                        Link?

                                        Visual Studio is an excellent GUIIDE.

                                        H 1 Reply Last reply
                                        0
                                        • C CaptainSeeSharp

                                          I've just rediscovered the beauty of color on black for programming environment. More information can be expressed with this type of color scheme. I like how numbers, strings, operators, identifiers all have a unique color that makes things much easier to sort through. The massive reduction of strain on the eyes is good also. Now I am looking for the best font to go with it. For those who customize their programming environment, what font do you use? What color scheme do you use? What is the best? I kind of like fonts that remind me of programming in DOS, however fixedsys and terminal are too big. I'm looking for something really really great that is specifically designed for programming.

                                          Watch the Fall of the Republic (High Quality 2:24:19)[^]

                                          A Offline
                                          A Offline
                                          Antonino Porcino
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #40

                                          I totally agree on having code on black background: much less strain for the eye and the quality of the display used is less important. For those who have always programmed on white background it's difficult to turn to black, but once switched it's forever. I also agree the importance of having proper designed fonts. In my 20 year programming experience I've always drawn myself the fonts I used for coding. I did that in DOS and do now in Windows. In Visual studio I designed a bitmap font that is two pixel wide in x and y so that it has a bold appearance making code very readable even on high resolution displays. Unfortunately bitmap fonts are no longer supported Windows/.NET so some modern editors won't accept bitmap fonts anymore; in this case I use a custom font derived from "Consolas bold" making it 75% wide than normal (so that it doesn't wast too much space in horizontal) Here is an example of Visual studio with my bitmap fonts And here an example of C Sharp Develop and custom Consolas Bold 75% wide

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