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Subject:RE: serif or san serif?? From:Matthew Horn <mhorn -at- macromedia -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 18 Jun 2003 15:53:49 -0400
> I am currently working on an online help system. In school
> we talked about
> using serif fonts for text and san serif for heading, etc.
> for looks and
> readability. I always thought that this carried over to the
> e-text as well.
> I have been hearing that studies say that sanserif is easier
> or better when
> looking at e-texts. Any one have answers?
You might take into consideration the length of the "e-text". If it's more than a page, many people might print it out to read it, especially so if the content is "deep". In that case, then a serif font would be more appropriate -- 1,000 years of paber-based printing can't be wrong.
As for reading san vs serif on a screen, I usually go with sans when designing online-anything -- for just the reason you mentioned... it often looks alot cleaner on the screen.
Matthew J. Horn
Sr. Technical Writer
< m a c r o m e d i a >
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