The ligatures are really interesting, but at a glance I process them so much slower than the raw characters, especially the ones that change the graphical semantics such as <= vs ≤. Does anyone have experience getting used to these and 1) does it end up faster? 2) once you are used to it is it harder than it was before to process the raw characters when reading code in fonts that don't have the same ligatures?
I see a lot of folks in this thread lamenting the usage of ligatures, but note that the downloaded set of font files includes a "JetBrainsMonoNL" version of all variants, which does not include ligatures ("NL", as in, "No Ligatures").<p>I do not like ligatures either, yet this is my favorite monospaced font. I use JetBrainsMonoNL in all the places.
There are a lot of code fonts on HN today. Rather than make a new post I will talk about some of my favorite that are a little less common. None of these are free I don't think.<p>Cartograph CF - The one I've been using for code for years. Very readable, almost "comic mono"-like choices of some of the lower case glyphs but in a good way. All the character is in the italic which you will either love or hate.<p>Quadraat sans mono - The entire quadraat family is a collection of masterpieces imo, but are generally too distinctive to be appropriate for most public-facing work. But it's your computer so who cares. I use the mono sans one for my terminal. The lowercase f seems so out of place there but you learn to love it.<p>Alegreya sans - <i>Not</i> a mono font, but it almost is so if you've ever flirted with proportional fonts for code this is a fun one to try. There is a lot of careful line width variation that gives a lot of the appearance and readability advantages of serifs but keeps most of the visual coherence of sans.<p>I like all of these because they feel more like normal fonts rather than code fonts. They have careful variation that adds character and improves readability for me. I've switched to an almost-no-color code theme that uses font weight instead, and the details like this become more important that way.<p>And then only kind of related but if you want to use unusual fonts in your terminal but you have a complex prompt setup, install font forge and learn to use something like <a href="https://github.com/ryanoasis/nerd-fonts/blob/master/font-patcher">https://github.com/ryanoasis/nerd-fonts/blob/master/font-pat...</a> to patch in the extra characters. This can also solve your "I love this font but want a dotted zero" type problems as well. Small skill investment for a small return over a long period of time. You'll always be using fonts.
I use this type face on pretty much everything that involves reading or writing code. It's great! Even comes with ligatures.<p>Victor Mono[0] is another great monospace font.<p>[0]: <a href="https://rubjo.github.io/victor-mono/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://rubjo.github.io/victor-mono/</a>
For me nothing can dethrone Inconsolata[0], there's just something elegant about it that I haven't found in other fonts I've tried. Been using it for almost ten years now. Also I don't like ligatures...<p>[0]:<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inconsolata" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inconsolata</a>
In my eyes, Liberation Mono is still the best programming font, due to how readable it is even in smaller sizes (and it comes with LibreOffice I think): <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation_fonts" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberation_fonts</a><p>There's also the Cousine version, which is more or less the same, both are also metrically compatible with Courier New: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croscore_fonts" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croscore_fonts</a><p>After that, I rather enjoy PT Mono, except that the full stop (dot) symbol feels too small, I actually use the PT Fonts for most of my personal webpages because they're decently readable and not too stylized, nor too boring: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PT_Fonts" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PT_Fonts</a><p>But frankly, there's <i>a lot</i> of good fonts out there and it's entirely a matter of taste. Some like ligatures, some don't. Some like monospaced fonts, others like proportional ones.<p>It's also really cool when the OS itself lets you set your font preferences for <i>most</i> applications that you're going to use, I catch myself wishing it'd be easy to do that for all of the JetBrains IDEs and other dev tools at the same time, though. Maybe a simple GUI program or a script that'd let me set those particular preferences for all of my editors in one go.
Is there really a better typeface than Apple's San Francisco Mono? I use it on all my machines, even my Windows and Linux ones. There are also versions with patched glyphs so you don't get boxes when trying to render certain characters.
Nothing beats Iosevka (<a href="https://github.com/be5invis/Iosevka">https://github.com/be5invis/Iosevka</a>) for me. It's narrow yet super readable, making great use of screen real estate. Lots of customization, ligatures, weights, and a nerd font patch for terminal.
It's weird how much I've come to like this font. And like @tentacleuno, I use it pretty much anywhere and everywhere I can get away using it.
I stick with <a href="https://www.nerdfonts.com/font-downloads" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.nerdfonts.com/font-downloads</a>, I need the glyphs. This would be a good candidate for nerdification.
I love this font, but I am currently giving Commit Mono (<a href="https://commitmono.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://commitmono.com/</a>) a spin. JetBrains did a great job.
I never actually understood the whole fuss about fonts.
I tried playing around with them few years ago and i never noticed that something is easier to read with some font or another, especially in the long term. Whenever i started using some font, i got completely used to it in few days. Therefore i just use the default fonts now.
I'm not even a Mac user by choice, but Monaco[0] has been a favorite of mine for years.<p>[0] <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monaco_(typeface)" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monaco_(typeface)</a>
This, and Roboto Mono, are my two desert island monospace typefaces. Are you allowed to have two desert island mono typefaces? I don't think I could could choose between them.
Not a fan of the ligatures, it's a pleasant looking garnish that requires translating to its underlying parts. So it would probably work for one person but butb not so great when sharing screen time with others, then it just becomes a distraction.
I greatly appreciate Jetbrains' software. But the only thing that I care about in a code font is balancing legibility with maximizing columns of text. Their overlay comparison to consolas fails on my main concern.
I just prefer Berkeley Mono.<p><a href="https://berkeleygraphics.com/typefaces/berkeley-mono/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://berkeleygraphics.com/typefaces/berkeley-mono/</a>
Absolutely the best font I’ve ever used. I can easily read letters from far, from close, in bright light, in darkness.. used it since day one. Also using it in my terminal. Thanks JetBrains, I love it.
This was my favorite font ever, made me stop font hopping...until I found that italic A and italic O are too similar, now I'm back to don't hopping.
I have been using it for a few months, both in JetBrains products as well as in Neovim. Looks great. I'm comfortable with their style of ligatures.
You should check out Fira Code if you get a chance - another great (imo) programming font.<p>Nerd Fonts has a version of it too if you need the glyphs.<p>Also it has ligatures too which I love.
I don't get the fuss about the JB typeface. I tried it, couldn't get used to the ligatures, and in the end, stopped using it after a few days.
While now there are many other good typefaces for programming languages, which are more or less equivalent to JetBrains Mono when restricted to the ASCII character set, JetBrains Mono has much better coverage of various Unicode blocks, e.g. of the mathematical symbols, and this is why I normally prefer it.
fwiw most (all?) JetBrains IDEs have a setting to enable/disable the ligatures.<p>Doesn't apply to everyone but I'm assuming some familiar with the JetBrains font will also be using some other things JetBrains makes.