Look, I want to support all characters for my projects- but whatever we have now (Verdana?) is a bit lacking.

Can we use a Unicode-heavy font like Quivira? I know serifs are annoying, but that's all there really is.

Segoe UI comes with MS Office 2007 and newer, and probably also with Windows Vista and newer. On the other hand, what the heck is Quivira and where do I get that from?!

Listen, have you tried installing linux? it ? ? ? ?  ? ? ? ? ? ?

࿕_࿖

If you're going to suggest a font, suggest a less eye-bleeding one like Linux Libertine.

And btw, I myself am a fan of (well-designed...) serif fonts, and your suggestion...how could you possibly think it looks good?

Segoe UI is probably still better than Linux Libertine regarding Unicode coverage, though. As much as I love LiLi otherwise.

Also! Unless you @font-face include fonts (e.g. from Google Fonts or commercial services such as Adobe Typekit), your browser will only be able to use fonts that are installed on your very own hard drive. Since most people these days use Windows 7 and Office 2010, Segoe UI is a rather safe bet. Websites do not usually submit fonts otherwise. Where they do, that is still a rather new thing, more or less.

Your browser, Zontas, picks Verdana because Rhetorica specified in the page layout that if your browser can't find Segoe UI or Gill Sans in your system's fonts folder (on Windows that is C:\Windows\Fonts, on Linux /usr/share/fonts and ~/.fonts), it should use the default sans-serif font that your browser is set to use. You can see those settings in the bottom right corner of the screenshot I posted above, the respective rule is highlighted.

this is because I use a mac...

Granted, Gill Sans probably doesn't cover much Unicode. Is there a standard, OK-looking font that comes with OSX and that has OK coverage at least of the various Latin code areas and IPA that could be set as a fallback font? I'm not gonna install an ugly font nobody's ever heard of just because Zontas uses a Mac.

Hint: Apple computers are not actually magical boxes which are different from all other computers in the world. HTML displays the same on a Mac as on a PC (the only possible difference is in the browser, and if Safari's that messed up [hint #2: it's not], get a different one). You can use the exact same standardized fonts anyone else can.

quoting Nessari:

Hint: Apple computers are not actually magical boxes which are different from all other computers in the world.

That, too. Even if Apple wants you to believe that. And what I said about browsers not supplying fonts on their own is just as valid for Macs.

First... Quivas is the ugliest font I've ever seen. For shame. For shame. Your earlier suggestion of Doulos SIL was much better. Second, I've implemented a universal solution for everyone: Settings. You can name any font you want. Be happy. (It's accessible from the "options settings" link on the toolbar at the right, next to the page mode links.)

quoting Rhetorica:

Second, I've implemented a universal solution for everyone: Settings. You can name any font you want. Be happy.

That is a nice solution, even though I'll leave it on standard.

Erm. At the time you implemented that, I changed my preference to Serif. And it worked perfectly. But sometime in the last couple weeks the site has forgotten that I set this; it is back to the default sans-serif font.

Having just re-changed it, it is back to serif again. But something did happen to the setting. Hopefully it won't be forgotten again?

Because of some cryptic PHP bug, updating your post count wipes all of the extended user variables (including the font settings and e-mail address.) Post count updates can potentially occur whenever someone views a post you've made, so there's a lot of room for failure. I started working on trying to crack this over the weekend; I'll get back on the hunt tonight.

Okay. Indeed, the font setting is gone again.