[kde-artists] [Bug 283928] Default font. GNOME has Cantarell, Unity has the Ubuntu font family, so KDE has...

https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=283928





--- Comment #21 from Alejandro Nova <alejandronova gmail com>  2011-11-08 22:44:07 ---
Nuno, some developments after this. After all, I am the mediator between that
"external group" (composed of me, myself and I, but that may change soon) and
KDE.

I've received the following words from Łukasz.

"Hello,
> I've been lobbying about my idea, and it's starting to get traction.
> However, we need funds to enable you to make a proper good design, and
> the KDE community can and should have a chance to contribute money
> towards a new UI font.
That's great news, thanks! Yes, I agree -- we will be preparing a
Kickstarter project.

When Microsoft was preparing its own rebranding and the branding of
Windows Vista, they decided to commission two variants of the Segoe family:

* The "Segoe" family was to be used for general Microsoft branding, for
print and web graphics, and for larger sizes. This family has a large
number of weights, basic screen optimization (hinting), and originally
had only the Latin extended character set. This is quite similar to the
current Lato family (although we'd like to add more characters).

* The "Segoe UI" family only comes with the 4 basic styles (Regular,
Italic, Bold, Bold Italic), has high-quality hinting and a large
character set, including Greek and Cyrillic, and quite a few "dingbat"
characters — arrows, emoticons and other semi-graphical elements. Its
spacing, proportions and the actual adjustment of weights are also
specifically optimized for the screen. In essence, Segoe UI is more like
a "low resolution" or "tiny size" variant of Segoe.

We think it's a very logical model and we'd like to follow a similar path.

So far, we've had some requests and ideas for a possible expansion of
Lato. Here are some key items. They are in no particular order, they
differ a lot when it comes to the actual amount of work required, and
we're looking for input from users such as yourself to help prioritize
and budget that:

a) Basic "Latin extended" character set (for all major European
languages using the Latin script)
b) More extended Latin character set (for smaller languages)
c) phonetic IPA characters
d) Basic Cyrillic (for major languages using the Cyrillic script:
Russian, Ukrainian, Serbian, Bulgarian)
e) Extended Cyrillic (for smaller Cyrillic languages such as Kazakh)
f) Monotonic Greek
g) Polytonic Greek
h) A set of narrow styles for all weights
i) A set of wide styles for all weights
j) Basic set of OpenType glyphs (for fractions, superscripts, subscripts
and other figure styles)
k) Small caps for all supported characters
l) Basic dingbats (triangles, squares, circles, arrows and other
geometric forms)
m) Emoticons and other dingbats specifically useful for UI applications
n) Additional dingbats
o) Mathematical characters
p) One monospaced style (Regular) for code display/programming
q) Additional monospaced styles (Bold, Italic, Bold Italic)
r) A serif companion for the family

As you can see, this is a long list -- practically open-ended.

So the questions that you (or someone at KDE) could answer, would be:

1. Would you like to see any design adjustments to the Lato family to
make it more suitable for UI use? (In general, and also -- if you have
any specific requirements).

2. Do you have any comments for the list of key items above? (Which key
items would you like to have addressed, in what order and on which
timeline).

3. Do you have any other items that you'd like to be added to the key
items list above? 

4. If we were to develop a specialized Lato UI family, what rough idea
of a budget do you think the KDE community would be willing to donate?

BTW: we just published an updated version 1.104 of Lato on
http://www.latofonts.com/ today. Some rendering problems with Adobe
applications and iOS have been resolved. This new version will soon also
be deployed on Google Web Fonts.

Many thanks for your support so far, and we'll be looking forward to
your comments.

Best regards,
Łukasz"

I would recommend to download Lato fonts, release 1.104. Lato authors used an
autohinting library (and helped with its bugs, too) to improve Lato's hinting,
so, it now looks more balanced and with better kerning at low resolutions.
Also, about Ivan's complaints, they have added more internationalization.

Łukasz plan is to fund this through Google Kickstarter, following a donation
model, and to do a true "Lato UI" font, based on Lato, for the KDE interface.
We need publicity to push this through all of our communities. Also, we need to
get an estimated amount of money to ask for.

I'm optimistic about this. Nuno, Ivan, what are your thoughts about this?

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