ADDING DIFFERENT FONTS
Along with changing the size and color of your text, you can change the font style (typeface) of all or certain portions of your Web text by including the FACE attribute within the <FONT> </FONT> tag. The FACE attribute is supported by Internet Explorer (version 2.0 and later) and Netscape (version 3.0 and later).
The catch, however, is that the individual viewing your Web page must have the exact font you designate installed on his or her computer. Since font collections vary from individual to individual and from Mac to PC, the FACE attribute hardly seems worth the trouble of including in your HTML design, but never fear. Microsoft is here.
Microsoft was the first to introduce the FACE attribute of the FONT tag, and in an attempt to provide both Mac and PC users with what the company calls "core fonts for the Web," Microsoft is giving away a healthy collection of TrueType fonts, available in both Windows and Apple Macintosh format at:
Free TrueType Fonts for the Web
http://www.microsoft.com/typography/fontpack/default.htm
These TrueType fonts are bundled with Internet Explorer, so it's a safe bet that most Explorer users will be able to view the font typeface you specify in your HTML if you make use of these "core" Web fonts. However, since most Mac users shy away from TrueType fonts in favor of more stable, less memory dependent PostScript fonts, it's all still a crap shoot until embedded fonts become the norm (and Microsoft is working hard with Adobe to make this a reality). Some fonts, though, are common to most operating systems and work well with the FONT FACE tag: Arial, Helvetica, Courier, Times.
So how does the FACE attribute work? Just like FONT SIZE and FONT COLOR. For instance, if you have the font specified by the FONT FACE tag in each of the examples below installed on your computer system, the text between the sample FONT FACE tags (in PURPLE) will be displayed in the font style designated within the FONT tag. If not, the font style will revert to the default font you have specified in your browser preferences:
<FONT FACE="Courier">Are you seeing Courier text?</FONT>
<FONT FACE="Arial">Are you seeing Arial text?</FONT>
<FONT FACE="Times">Are you seeing Times text?</FONT>
<FONT FACE="Verdana">Are you seeing Verdana text?</FONT>
<FONT FACE="Comic Sans MS">Are you seeing Comic Sans?</FONT>
<FONT FACE="Georgia">Are you seeing Georgia text?</FONT>
<FONT FACE="Impact">Are you seeing Impact text?</FONT>
<FONT FACE="Trebuchet MS">Are you seeing Trebuchet?</FONT>
In addition, you can specify more than one font in the FONT FACE tag. If the person viewing your Web page doesn't have the first font specified, then text will be displayed in the second font listed. If the second is unavailable, then the text will be displayed in the third choice, and so on. If none of the fonts listed are installed on the viewer's computer system, then the font specified in the viewer's browser preferences will be used. Here is what the HTML looks like (in PURPLE) when specifying more than one font — in this instance, Arial, Verdana, Charcoal, and Times:
<FONT FACE="Arial, Verdana, Times">Some Text</FONT>
Note: You can change the size, color and font face of the text within a single FONT tag:
The FONT FACE tag works the same way in both Netscape and Internet Explorer with one exception. In Netscape, text enclosed in a TABLE automatically reverts to the default font (your browser font) so you must use the FONT FACE tag again within a table to specify a font style. This is not the case with Internet Explorer. Once you designate a font using the FONT FACE tag in Explorer, the font face will hold for all text up to the closing font tag (</FONT>). |
