Droid Sans

[Rosie]

Info I've found on this font says its an Internet font and that it's mobile ready, but a consultant I hired told me there are only three Internet safe fonts that are recognize by search engines and can be read by both Mac's and PC's. I did a little of my own research and think she may not be completely up-to-date, but I don't know if being designed for the web and being mobile ready mean that search engines recognize it, or if it will look the same on PC's and Mac's. Does anyone know?

Thanks in advance.

http://Droid Sans

[Summer]

I call shenanigans on her. Since search engines care more about the content and not a whit about what font is used, I'm mildly irked that she's able to make money peddling such blatantly wrong tips.

She's confused about the "old days", say 1997-2001, when web designers tended to use a lot of images for the text in their websites because there was a limited selection of HTML viable fonts. For a few years after that, Flash was the big thing in implementing better fonts, and we all know how search engines can't index content embedded in Flash.

If your website content text is properly identifiable via markup, which font you use doesn't matter a bit to the search engines. And the vast number of choices available via Google's web fonts would also seem to indicate that she's overcharging her clients for her lack of current education in her field.

But, Google has begun nudging site rankings higher or lower based on how mobile-friendly they are, how responsive they are on different devices, but that's completely separate from the images as text thing thing which is 14 years out of date now.

These are the only resources I found:
A Google Webmaster video from 2012: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hb4LYWxXESY

Google Webmasters announcement about Google Fonts: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2011/02/beyond-times-and-arial-new-web-safe.html (which also mentions how it's not necessary anymore to use Flash to incorporate better fonts into websites)

And Droid Sans is available as a web font: http://www.google.com/fonts/specimen/Droid+Sans

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WordPress / Genesis Site Design & Troubleshooting: A Touch of Summer | @SummerWebDesign
Slice of SciFi | Writers, After Dark

[Rosie]

Hi Summer,

Thanks for verifying what I suspected based on my research about the fonts. I further researched the Droid Sans font and learned that the company worked with Google to make it work on the Droid mobile platform, so I'm guessing it might not work on other platforms like the iphone, so I probably won't use it.

I guess it doesn't matter if my consultant sticks with the fonts she's using and I agree she needs current info which I'll try giving her with finesse. She does a lot of different things and this isn't her specialty, which is why I researched after talking to her.

Rosie

[Summer]

Using fonts on websites is different from trying to install a partifular font for you to use with Word or Photoshop/Illustrator on your computer, but if you are worried about that, that's why the CSS font declarations have fallbacks, so that if someone's computer can't render a font, you control what fallback font to use so you can maintain some control over typeface.

That's also one reason people use Google's web fonts, folks browsing your site load the font from Google and see it the way they're meant to.

Also a quick search notes that iOS devices have had native Droid Sans since iOS 4.

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WordPress / Genesis Site Design & Troubleshooting: A Touch of Summer | @SummerWebDesign
Slice of SciFi | Writers, After Dark

[Rosie]

Thanks Heather. It all sounds complicate for someone without a tech background. And, I'm not sure my average reader would go to the trouble of going to Google and loading font. I think I'll just stick with traditional fonts and use other design elements to spice thing up a bit.

I appreciate all your input. It helped me sort ot what I need to do.

Rosie

[Summer]

Ha, you misunderstand... if you incorporate the font into your CSS file, Google will load it for everyone who visits your site. You design your site using the fonts you want to use, and Google provides the font for everyone with a browsing-capable device.

For instance, here's the reference from News Pro for the Raleway font:

body {
	background-color: #f6f5f2;
	color: #666;
	font-family: 'Raleway', sans-serif;
	font-size: 16px;
	font-size: 1.6rem;
	font-weight: 400;
	line-height: 1.625;
}

and the call from functions.php that loads it:

wp_enqueue_style( 'google-fonts', '//fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Raleway:400,700|Pathway+Gothic+One', array(), CHILD_THEME_VERSION );

If you go to the demo site: http://demo.studiopress.com/news/

you don't have to load anything from Google yourself, do you? That's what's great about Google fonts, everyone who has access to Google's servers while they are surfing the web, the fonts will load.

Thus there's no need to limit your design choices because a consultant who doesn't know any better told you to do so. Now if that same person is doing the CSS and design for you, you need to find someone else who is not 14 years out of date with web design techniques.

---

WordPress / Genesis Site Design & Troubleshooting: A Touch of Summer | @SummerWebDesign
Slice of SciFi | Writers, After Dark

[Rosie]

Summer,
Thanks for clarifying. I did misunderstand. No the web designer is different than the consultant.
Rosie

[Summer]

Excellent! Good luck, and don't hold yourself back on the design you truly want.

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WordPress / Genesis Site Design & Troubleshooting: A Touch of Summer | @SummerWebDesign
Slice of SciFi | Writers, After Dark

[Rosie]

Thanks so much Summer. I'll incorporate design elements, but maybe not many things that require CSS. It's just getting too expensive. I am going to go with Weaver, so maybe since other changes are automatic, I can do something with fonts.

Rosie

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