Notes

FOUT

Google’s Steve Souders has put together an excellent test page demonstrating the issue of slow loading fonts embedded using @font-face causing a Flash of Unstyled Text (FOUT). Covering a comprehensive range of examples his test page highlights some potential issues we might face as @font-face begins to take hold.

Mark Boulton’s presentation at last week’s Build Conference covered this topic very effectively. Building on his Web Directions South 09 presentation on Typographic Structure, his Build presentation demonstrated the importance of a well considered fallback font stack to minimise the visual effects of this.

With luck, and a little friendly persuasion, Mr Boulton might cover this in further detail at The Personal Disquiet of Mark Boulton.

[Via Mr Shiflett.]

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In addition to their role as lecturers in interactive design at the University of Ulster at Belfast, where they have been active in promoting a web standards-based curriculum, Christopher Murphy and Nicklas Persson are practicing designers and digital artists. Their work has featured in a variety of design books and magazines alongside numerous internationally respected designers and they are regular speakers at design conferences and workshops worldwide.

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