Cross Platform Font Layout - current workarounds

[JB]

Well it sounds like some of them expected you to get off the ship,
and to do that by walking the plank.

JB

> On Aug 25, 2020, at 4:37 PM, Sean Cole (Pi) via use-livecode <use-livecode at lists.runrev.com> wrote:
> 
> Of course I'm going to respond badly to this kind
> of bullying. What did you all expect!
> 
> Sean Cole
> *Pi Digital *
> 
> 
>> On Tue, 25 Aug 2020 at 23:04, Bob Sneidar via use-livecode <
>> use-livecode at lists.runrev.com> wrote:
>> 
>> I’ll toss this in. I was using a Mac font that had a Windows corollary (I
>> thought) but when I dug deeper I found that the Mac had individual type
>> faces whereas the Windows equivalent did not. This font was a BUILT-IN font
>> on both platforms!
>> 
>> The result is if I chose the bold version of the font for something like a
>> Header or a Label, it wouldn’t be either the font chosen OR bold in
>> Windows, although it looks absolutely fine on the Mac.
>> 
>> The Livecode devs CANNOT take liberties with this sort of thing! What can
>> they do?? Write code that guesses what it was the developer was trying to
>> do? It’s absurd to think this is even a problem that CAN be solved at the
>> application level.
>> 
>> THAT BEING SAID…
>> What I DID do successfully was find an app that was able to CONVERT the
>> Mac font type faces into WINDOWS font files, and then I was able to install
>> them in Windows and I got pretty much what I expected to get.
>> 
>> Bob S
>> 
>> 
>>> On Aug 25, 2020, at 10:51 AM, Andrew at MidWest Coast Media via
>> use-livecode <use-livecode at lists.runrev.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Sean-
>>> 
>>> My degree is in TV/stage production and digital design. I’ve built web
>> sites (HTML, WordPress, LiveCode), produced/directed broadcast and
>> streaming programs, and delivered custom software on Mac/PC/Web (using
>> Director and Flash), and now Mac/PC/iOS/Android using LiveCode (because
>> you’re right, the HTML5 port isn’t ready for primetime).
>>> 
>>> Anyone who thinks pixel perfection across mediums is possible has never
>> worked on a web platform; this usually ends up being UI designers who only
>> work in theoreticals. That InDesign file they mocked up might look great
>> saved as a PDF or printed on a specific coated paper using Pantone inks,
>> but those CMYK colors and Post Script fonts are rendered using RGB and WOFF
>> in a web browser or desktop computer so they won’t look the same: and
>> there’s not a damn thing you can do about it (short of making everything an
>> image, but you still can’t make-up for the color gamut differences). The
>> WYSWIG hacks that sufficed in the 90s/00s to make things visually similar
>> were always shoddy at-best creating hundreds of additional lines of code
>> and won’t pass muster with current accessibility standards even if they did
>> "work".
>>> 
>>> Fonts have ALWAYS been one of the most difficult parts of app
>> development. Whether it’s getting legal fonts (the good ones aren’t cheap,
>> and the cheap ones aren’t good), or cross-platform fonts (not every OS
>> reads the same format, and not every font is available in multiple
>> formats). The closest I’ve come has been to run some scripts when
>> populating text fields to make sure they fit the dimensions allotted in the
>> design. Text doesn’t fit in box? Reduce the fontSize by 1 until it does.
>> Text doesn’t fill the space? Increase the fontSize by 1 until it does. It’s
>> a PITA, so I usually add this in at the end since the art department seems
>> to have another “small change” along the way.
>>> 
>>> Programming isn't a science as much as an art. With your broadcasting
>> background you understand that a projects aren’t “done” until the deadline:
>> there is ALWAYS something else you would have tweaked if you had more time
>> (2 weeks?!?). But I get it: producers are generally unreasonable eggplant
>> emojis that are notoriously difficult to please.
>>> 
>>> While LiveCode DOES require some if platform() conditionals, I can only
>> imagine coding this in Swift and Java (even for a unicorn proficient in
>> BOTH) would still take much longer and NOT give the pixel perfection you
>> are referring to. I say “imagine” because I don’t know, and never had to
>> learn, those languages since I could easily pick-up LiveCode from the
>> various programming environments I’ve previously developed for. My copy of
>> Microsoft Windows looks different on my iMac than it does on my Dell, and
>> it wasn’t a fireable offense for the development team.
>>> 
>>> —Andrew Bell
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