IBM / plex

The package of IBM’s typeface, IBM Plex.
SIL Open Font License 1.1
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Curly quotes are nearly indistinguishable in Plex Mono. #342

Closed ghost closed 4 years ago

ghost commented 4 years ago

I have small a perl script that changes typewriter quotes to curly quotes for typesetting purposes. It was very difficult to verify that the script worked correctly in my terminal because the left and right curly quotes are so similar. I ended up needing to use a different font to be certain no mistakes had been made.

I am not sure if this causes issues for others, as curly quotes are rarely used in programming, but for my workflow (graphics, typesetting) it is an issue.

mjabbink commented 4 years ago

@runrin The quotes and apostrophes were a deliberate design choice. As you can see below in a few examples of other typeface designs that have also included a less “curly” approach. Plex Mono is primarily used for coding where the straight quotes are typically used but for typesetting we opted for the less curly approach like you see in Verdana and Apple SF.

Screen Shot 2020-09-29 at 3 27 18 AM
mjabbink commented 4 years ago

We will consider the option to create more contrast between them but closing for now.