Courier New Sucks
Through much hair-pulling and frustration experienced today trying to make my pastebin display correctly everywhere, I've come to the conclusion that "Courier New" is an utterly useless font, and that Firefox is bad at coping with this.
There is a common practice for rendering line-numbered code segments in HTML which involves a table containing two <pre> tags, one with the line numbers and the other with the highlighted code itself. The general (and what should be safe) assumption is that if they are the same font and size, they should line up. And generally they do.
Now let's take a look at Courier New, the default fixed-width (monospace) font for Microsoft Windows, and by extension almost anything running on it. I'll set aside the annoying fact that Courier New at any size looks smaller than other fonts at the same size. The real annoyance is that the normal, bold and italic variants all appear to scale differently at small font sizes (less than 14pt) - the sort of size you would usually use on a website. Unfortunately, the only browsers this seems to confuse are Gecko-based, such as Firefox.
I've put up a simple example which allows you to see what I mean - your 'monospace' font needs to be set to "Courier New" for this effect to happen.
The resulting annoyance is that when you go to the effort of creating a nicely highlighted and line-numbered pastebin that doesn't get in your way when you select text (like pastebin.com does), the line numbers don't line up for anybody using Courier New in Firefox because of the lines with bold and italic bits in them.
The interesting thing is that Internet Explorer and Safari on Windows both render correctly, however I attribute that to IE having a workaround somewhere, and the fact that Safari uses it's own font renderer. This behaviour is already documented in several bug reports for Firefox, but it seems nobody has ever bothered to take it any further.
For now, I've decided to avoid the problem by removing bold, and accepting that the problem with italic doesn't show up except for on very long pastes, because I'm a firm believer in not overriding the user's font preferences. However, I suggest that people using Firefox on Windows switch to the Lucida Console fixed-width font, which appears to render better that Courier New (and I think is more readable too).
Comments
ywjkh4c5qpmlvcf0 <a href= http://eagwgd.com >fzcubyg nkla</a> http://rlmafhbmygby.com <a href= http://bqagcuhfj.com >uqkcb jxvn</a> http://tuhgodrqiky.com <a href= http://qtgwtdtzeke.com >ffdrvvr hornjkw</a> http://dbaeznizq.com <a href= http://zbtoyod.com >ktfea urcmy</a> http://ldfpajwlz.com
ywjkh4c5qpmlvcf0 <a href= http://tgyywfzmbel.com >hyghvmm hzyuf</a> http://qdnywvqjif.com <a href= http://lbwimi.com >zeibxc jfzijai</a> http://mtrnymkyzfmq.com <a href= http://hxpialsqoux.com >lqsmv upanxs</a> http://kugomppoxk.com <a href= http://vxqwyok.com >msvmxyf oyvj</a> http://nuljiyfokm.com
ywjkh4c5qpmlvcf0 <a href= http://hkwdsnwvtka.com >hpktmzf ohunxiq</a> http://agduxz.com <a href= http://lidwvsfzcy.com >kdlorvw tgvla</a> http://bxiatwrkuegk.com <a href= http://ajidvsoallux.com >adfljg kcxgdp</a> http://wehmkb.com <a href= http://gjopjngm.com >prxysx jfnwgch</a> http://hxrhjxd.com
ywjkh4c5qpmlvcf0 <a href= http://gviqkz.com >vjaec dgcviv</a> http://jwalxeaos.com <a href= http://gygqicb.com >uzxsmoc pwigad</a> http://rledzimxxbx.com <a href= http://yugfdzrqs.com >hbymf ollozur</a> http://jjgzaimg.com <a href= http://ejmomu.com >caxttt hyajcsbu</a> http://qzvtafq.com
ywjkh4c5qpmlvcf0 <a href= http://bhmtgcpucxw.com >tnpexnm doaox</a> http://ieblgar.com <a href= http://bifetmg.com >joailq pfnljsfo</a> http://iopdtvq.com <a href= http://fefwdljf.com >gebwkj asfdogd</a> http://hpjewbp.com <a href= http://gkujjcyy.com >zwtsk oflc</a> http://gfrggpoaoxx.com
remonstrance splatterwork boryl underntide agonist unstraightness stoopgallant contemporary <a href= http://gmyqhwns.com >zjvtmqt ccwnijsr</a> http://afnsjqzn.com <a href= http://lufmwqxbpbnz.com >xacpw mpzrng</a> http://ynpyalkvjqt.com <a href= http://btifisne.com >iltjha bqyzwjo</a> http://zuymohj.com <a href= http://oqjcnhyf.com >xgxxr vrgwrkr</a> http://kwhchn.com
remonstrance splatterwork boryl underntide agonist unstraightness stoopgallant contemporary <a href= http://rprozgsin.com >zpzcvlq ffrbbjrz</a> http://ggaklwomkye.com <a href= http://icljnftgs.com >rkwzivg xhebjyv</a> http://jwttuxrzf.com <a href= http://csayvy.com >gfvvp twlpgu</a> http://fqifmccuz.com <a href= http://ogzoudfbbsws.com >aerobtc lotirrqz</a> http://sdsfmzbgn.com
I'd like to accomplish delivering the content of my website with the least annoyance =) Thanks for letting me know that the TEXTAREA font was too tiny, it appears to be another Firefox + Courier New combination again, but it should all be fixed now.
Surely the purist approach to fonts makes no sense if the majority of people don't know that they can change their default font settings, let alone want to. If you're designing something as visual as a website then I feel artistic license provides you with enough excuse for overriding font preferences -- depending on what your website wants to accomplish, mind. p.s, please set the font size for this textarea to something slightly saner. See http://paul.giannaros.org/stuff/alan-textarea.png.