Talk:Typography

"Digital typography"
has just added a See Also link to Digital Typography. At present, that is a redirect to Desktop publishing, which really has little if anything to do with typography. I see that it was discussed at Redirects for discussion/Log/2019 May 12 as 'keep' with minimal debate. (I for one didn't see it). It feels like a very dated perspective to me: DTP hasn't really been a "thing" in getting on for 20 years. What I expected from 'digital typography' was something like Bézier curve.

Is there any future in reopening this debate in less than a year? ,  for comment because I won't waste everyone's time at RfD if the outcome is not virtually assured. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 19:32, 23 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Thank you for following up on that; I've included the see-also wikilink to raise awareness about this issue, whose solution wasn't clear to me. Two other related redirects are Digital typesetting and Digital publishing. I'd suggest retargeting Digital typography to typography. fgnievinski (talk) 20:06, 23 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I also believe that it should redirect to Typography. We could maybe develop a new section of this article, summarising the more relevant articles listed at the Digital Typography line from the Typography navbox:
 * Character encoding
 * Font hinting
 * Font rasterization
 * List of typographic features
 * Web typography
 * (Desktop publishing is conspicuously absent.)
 * Digital typesetting redirects to Typesetting, which is sensible model to follow (IMO, obviously). Digital publishing redirects to Electronic publishing, for which it is an obvious synonym. But not to DTP...
 * , as recent editor of Font rasterization, would you care to contribute to this discussion? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 12:40, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I completely agree that Desktop publishing is not an appropriate redirect for Digital typography. I'm not clearly understanding what the larger question is, or what a solution might be. Sorry. — RCraig09 (talk) 15:03, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
 * and I think that it should redirect to Typography, ideally Typography#Digital typography. But not DTP, which is the larger issue such as it is. --John Maynard Friedman (talk)
 * Late comment (came here from JMF's post on Talk:Graphite (smart font technology)), but I do agree that DTP is a terrible redirect target. JMF's navbox-based suggestion seems correct at least in terms of scope, though I don't think that I'm ready to make the page. Artoria2e5 🌉 07:00, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

In the light of the discussion above have been bold and changed the redirect target to typography. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 16:35, 6 January 2024 (UTC)
 * It is just an uncited stub for openers, please improve! --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 16:52, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Merge from Type design
Type design currently seems like a mash-up of Typography and Font that covers the same material but not as well. I propose it just be merged into those articles (or others as appropriate) and redirected here, perhaps to Typography or something. -- Beland (talk) 19:07, 15 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Strong oppose. Type designers design typefaces: it is primarily an art form with some technical skills. Typographers use typefaces to lay out pages, it is primarily a technical skill with some artistic elements (less so with a simple book, more so with advertising material, more still with 'arthouse' publications. They are different things. For example, Eric Gill, best known for Gill Sans, designed the typeface used by the Golden Cockerel Press but he was not the leading printer.
 * Compare choreography v. dance, playwriting v. acting, etc etc.
 * The solution is to clean up type design. I will have a look now. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 19:34, 15 June 2021 (UTC)
 * 's criticism is certainly justified. The type design article had accumulated some uninformed detritus over the years, mainly in the lead and the history. I suspect that some contributing editors didn't appreciate the difference between type design and typography, perhaps because of sloppy usage elsewhere. (Compare proof reading and copy editing, same sort of concept drift). I have begun to clean it up and make the differences clearer. Fortunately most of the body is in reasonable shape so it shouldn't take too long. The big challenge is to find citations, which are sadly lacking at present.


 * As for the idea of a #Design section in the Typography article, I can't see how that would work? Typographers certainly deploy design skills but they are about how to lay out a page, some of which can be very fancy indeed. The typeface(s) they use just one tool among many. So a section about design in typography would have to be about page design in general, not just this isolated aspect of it. (I'm using the word 'page' very loosely here, for convenience. It could be a whole book, a website, a cornflakes packet). --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 23:26, 15 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Or a poster, as just added. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 00:09, 16 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Well, Typography says that type design is simply one part of typography, and that aligns with my understanding of the common meaning. If you want to cover the details of page design and choice of text appearance vs. font/typeface/character design in separate articles, that's fine by me, as long as it's clear and accessible. But in that case, I'd probably merge most of this article into Font or Typeface and a create Design section there. Type design basically repeats part of what Font says, but in less detail. -- Beland (talk) 06:22, 16 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, I agree with that definition of the scope of typography in its broadest sense and typeface design certainly belongs in category:typography. It is just that type design has a long history with a peak of activity in the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries that merits its own article (and conversely would bog down the typography article).
 * There is a much stronger case (which I would support) to merge the typeface, font and type design articles.--John Maynard Friedman (talk) 14:46, 16 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment: I don't have a strong opinion either way about Type design, and if wants to clean up that page, as he started doing, that sounds like a good start - I look forward to seeing how he changes it. I do agree there is a high degree of overlap between Typeface and Font, with Type design sharing some of that overlap (although I see sections of it pointing over to relevant sections of Font). I also see there is a separate Typeface anatomy article that also has information that is found in various forms on all of these other pages (including Typography). If someone has the time and energy to think through the best to resolve the overlaps, I think several of these pages could be merged. (Having said that, I don't see myself having the time to do so anytime soon.) - Dyork (talk) 00:45, 20 June 2021 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I paused work on cleaning up the type design article expecting further comment from, as I don't see much point in continuing to work on it if the RTM (as currently stated) succeeds. If instead my counter-proposal is agreed, the surgery will be so substantial that there doesn't seem much sense in fine-tuning the article as it stands. Either way, it is a project for some long dark evenings: I'm in no hurry either. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 07:37, 20 June 2021 (UTC)
 * If your proposal is to merge Typeface, Font, and Type design, that seems like a good idea, of course explaining the different terms. -- Beland (talk) 16:52, 20 June 2021 (UTC)
 * , yes, precisely. But you would have to close your RtM before I could open another? Either way, it is a big job so I plan to create a draft (at Typeface/Sandbox?) for others to advise and comment as it progresses. But it won't be this month. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 16:59, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Done! Beland (talk) 20:54, 20 June 2021 (UTC)


 * Tyvm. I'd better open a formal RtM on the other three before starting any work, in case it is opposed. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 09:06, 21 June 2021 (UTC)
 * FTR, I started a discussion at Talk:Typeface. -- Beland (talk) 22:41, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Intent to move Dagger (typography) to Dagger (symbol)
The dagger symbol is just another symbol and it is just strange (to my eyes) to disambiguate using (typography) rather than (symbol) like every other ambiguously named symbol. Quite a few articles link here so rather than just WP:BEBOLD, I thought it best to ask have I missed something, why has no one moved it before now. Any comments to talk:Dagger (typography), please. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 18:43, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Unreferenced section
Moving unsourced comments from the article here instead of deleting them. Restoring them to the article should be done with an accompanying reference.

The aesthetic concerns in typography deal not only with the careful selection of one or two harmonizing typefaces and relative type sizes but also with laying out elements to be printed on a flat surface tastefully and appealingly, among others. For this reason, typographers attempt to observe typographical principles, the most common of which are: Airborne84 (talk) 00:07, 4 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Limit up to three colors, which should harmonize with each other and with the color of the paper and the dominant color(s) of the photo or graphics
 * Limit to two typefaces on a single page, which should "match"
 * Limit up to three fonts and sizes
 * Select the size of leading to be optimal and most pleasing to the eyes.
 * The number of different enhancements such as greater size, bold, italic fonts, capitalization, or different typeface, different color, as used for headlines and emphasized words inside the text block, should be limited and consistent and be judiciously selected
 * Avoid underlining, which when used should not be on top of another enhancement
 * Text should be placed judiciously to naturally lead the eye from one text to the next
 * Multi-line headlines should be segmented by phrases (no phrase should be split into two lines)
 * No widows and orphans (no beginning line of paragraph at the bottom of page, no last line of paragraph at the top of page)
 * Likewise no headline is at the page bottom
 * The last line of a paragraph should flush with the preceding lines and not stand alone below a picture
 * The printing elements should not be scattered in the hodgepodge fashion across the page unless it truly conveys hodgepodge.
 * The letters V and W at the beginning of a paragraph line should extend a little to the left of the vertical left flush line to give an optical impression of being flush with lines below.

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