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Typekit: A Designer’s Godsend

Posted April 1, 2010 – 01:40 in: dhp1080, syndicated

Since virtually the beginning of the web, universally identical fontography has been a problem. Every platform ships with different fonts which render differently in nearly every browser. However, with the advent of Typekit, utilizing obscure fonts to achieve design perfection has become feasible.

Since very early versions of Internet Explorer (I’m talking version 4.0), the @font-face {} CSS attribute has been supported. It wasn’t until Firefox 3.5 that @font-face was an accepted CSS attribute in the internet’s most loved browser. However, the problem still remains that different font file types are needed for certain browsers, and font licensing issues remain as commercial fonts could easily be downloaded from the hosting web server.

Now, Typekit seems to solve these problems with a nice solution of using javascript to display their expansive selection of over 400 fonts. Now, nothing’s perfect, but Typekit is as close to universally identical fontography as you can get.

Want to use the same font in your logo as the title of all of your posts? Easy. Just embed the javascript, setup the font you want to use, and you’re good to go. All hosting of font files is taken care of on Typekit’s distribution network.

I talked previously (a long time ago) about sIFR, a flash-based font replacement tool. Unlike sIFR, Typekit uses standards-compliant javascript to replace text, making for a much more open and usable product. Did I mention there’s a free version? Sure there are a few limitations, but I’d say it’s definitely worthwhile to try out.

Check it out at typekit.com.

Via dhp1080 from 1080degrees

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