

FontSprite - a new approach to custom fonts on the web - digitalclubb
http://jasper.clarkberg.org/fontsprite/index.html

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winestock
From the website:

"By using the FontSprite generator, you can create sprite images of glyphs
from your chosen font. Then, give the FontSprite engine your image, and the
metrics data that the generator calculated for you. On your website, the
engine creates a span for every letter, and perfectly sprites and places the
rendered font as a background image, to create the illusion of custom fonted
text! Best of all, you can copy and paste! (kinda)"

This is such an ugly hack. I'm giving this story an upvote just for the
persistence this guy showed. To see how this affects selecting text, go to the
examples page: <http://jasper.clarkberg.org/fontsprite/engine.html#examples>
And try to select the text at the top of the page (viz, Here is some text set
in Adelle. Make it casual with some Idolwild! Even Zapfino kinda works)

Notice how the selection appears offset from the displayed text? Jarring.

I admire this hacker for his ingenuity and persistence, but font-embedding
will only be practical for websites with a dedicated audience, I'm afraid.

