Re: EM

keka@im.se wrote at 02/02/00 11:43

>And the original complaint
>   about the uselessness in practice of the "point size" also
>   comes from "real typographers".

It seems strange that, although many different proposals have been put 
forward for measuring type - and many have been put into practice, that 
the vast majority of type users still specify size by point size - based 
on an obsolete movable type system.

This isn't an accident, it isn't a conspiracy.

I think the concept here is: "Learn from history", not "change for 
change's sake".

If you want to use pixels to measure an em, fine, mm, fine, width of 
human hair, fraction of the distance from pole to pole, the size of the 
cigar of the president of the USA, fine, fine, fine.

But at the end of the day, the definitive measure is the (obsolete) body 
size, not the cap, x or anything else.


-- Clive

Received on Thursday, 3 February 2000 10:23:00 UTC