Showing posts with label garamond. Show all posts
Showing posts with label garamond. Show all posts

Saturday 24 January 2015

Garamond open source font for ink saving - fails a quick standard test

Does it work for printing paypal payment emails? 
Garamond fails this quick standard test in HP lazerjet draft mode, but so do other fonts.

This is a slightly daft post because I'm not sure how to specify an unusual font on blogspot. If the typeface looks like something out of a 1930s american magazine, that's Garamond, otherwise not. Never mind. The source code for specifying a font works for a bit but tangles-up after a few edits.
The other font links above make more sense.

Anyway I get paypal emails that are a very good practical test of one use for a font. They say:

"someone has bought your item and the address somewhere down the blurb is
name
street numberbla bla bla bla
bla bla
postcode or zip code
bla bla the email carries on, and 12pt font shows
what paid and what for on the same page"

These verbose emails are a good source of customer's delivery addresses in a format you can bung inside a used window envelope and send without re-typing. If you want to avoid editing, then you need about 12pt type to get the payment amount on the same side of paper.
Garamond does not work well on screen at 12pt. Click the link & control+F to "the reason" to see the reason why. I have not read what the link says but it looks plausible.. Larger than 12pt it is still hard to read, and the email needs editing to get the vital payment amount and address onto one side of paper.

Garamond does not print well on HP lazerjet draft mode - that is in grey at 300 dpi. I can hardly read it at 12pt. The chances of it workng as well as OCRB for optical character recognition at a sorting office look low. This is a pity, because I thought while writing previous posts that Garamond provided was the best balance between ink costs and readabiliy. Now I think that if an ebay sale is to be trusted to the

  • scanners at the post office to recognise the right address and get it the right postie quickly without delay and human error 
  • posties to poke it through the right letterbox...
...then spindly type in barely legible grey is not the answer. Never mind.
Maybe there is some way of setting email software to display paypal emails in a certain way.

Infinate wisdom will be available on this blog some time, if not quite yet.

Oh this last bit is just about getting hold of Garamond font for free.
You may well have Garamond as one of your bundle of fonts that is somehow on your computer. If not, google an open source version which exists and copy the unzipped download files to your fonts folder. To find the fonts folder, search your disk for .ttf of .o ... no I've forgotten the second one, but those are the two file name endings most used for font files which are vector graphics of the extended alphabet in whatever font. There's also a way of getting google's online version which I've tried to use on this document while somehow stripping-out the line breaks



10 Jul 2015 17:50:19 BST | Transaction ID: 2CJ638761U323354Y 

Dear Veganline.com, You received a payment of £29.99 GBP from person (person78@example.com) Thanks for using PayPal. You can now send any items. To see all the transaction details, log in to your PayPal account. It may take a few moments for this transaction to appear in your account. <h3>This item is eligible for Seller Protection.</h3>Don't forget to:- Send the item to the delivery address below within 7 days. Please note: items delivered in person or to a different address are not covered by Seller Protection. - Use a trackable proof of delivery. Find out more about Seller Protection Reversals:Please be aware that your payment can still be reversed, (e.g. if it is subject to a chargeback), even after you have sent the item to your buyer. Complying with PayPal's Seller Protection and following the trading guidelines on our Security page helps to protect you from things like chargebacks. 
---------------------------------------------------------------- 
Buyer: Person Person person@example.com
Confirmed delivery address 

Person Person 
5 Street Name 
Bedford, 
Bedfordshire 
Mk41 8NX 
United Kingdom 

Note to seller: The buyer hasn't sent a note. Dispatch details: You haven’t added any dispatch details. 
----------------------------------- 
Purchase Details 
----------------------------------- 
Description: 
Hozelock Cascade 1000 Koi Fish Pond Pump Water Garden Fountain Waterfall Pump , Item # 131549462810 Qty: 1 Unit Price: 26.99 GBP Total: 26.99 GBP Postage and packaging: 3.00 GBP Insurance - not offered: ---- Total: 29.99 GBP Payment: 29.99 GBP Payment sent to: person@example.com
---------------------------------------------------------------- 

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