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Comment by bberrry | Hacker News Reader

I desperately want to find a new code font to love but I always return to Consolas.

Have you tried Source Code Pro (http://adobe-fonts.github.io/source-code-pro/)? It's my go-to now when it comes to monospace fonts. I keep it installed on all my systems, right along side my dotfiles.

Mine too, especially for the light version for non-retina OSX!

I love it too, using it on Xcode and iTerm

Can you set iTerm to use Light as the Regular font and then use Regular font as the Bold font?

I'm particularly fond of semi-bold. I find light is too narrow for my vision and taste. After a while of using the light version, it starts to blur together, but semibold works well. But my wife uses light and regular on her high DPI Lenovo.

Well, I'm glad there are these variations for peoples preferences, I wish multiple font wights was a more common option.

Trying "Source Code Pro Light," it reminds me of one of the fonts on Solaris CDE but a bit more sensible.

Aha! You're right...

I use source code pro lite on everything that requires monospaced fonts now. I use source sans pro a lot in documents / email.

I've been using Source Code Pro Light for quite a while. It's great.

Here's another vote for Source Code Pro. It's an amazingly attractive font. I'm glad I discovered it.

Yeah, this is my go-to as well.

Does it show more lines than consolas in the editor? I just measured Hack with Consolas (9pt) in VS.NET, and Hack shows 54 lines, Consolas 65 (and for reference, lucida console 131). The page you linked to shows the typeface, which is nice, but it's hard to measure whether it's a font that's going to lead to more lines or less lines in the editor.

I switched from Consolas to Source Code Pro after I switched to a 4k monitor. On a 1080p display, I think I still prefer Consolas, but Source Code Pro is absolutely beautiful on a high-dpi screen.

For a complete change of style it might be worth having a look at fonts designed assisting those with dyslexia. Designed for uniqueness of glyphs and for minimising eye strain.

https://gumroad.com/l/OpenDyslexic# http://dyslite.com/home/download/dyslite-mono-dyslexic/

I've used them for several years ( even though I'm not dyslexic ) and now find 'normal' terminal fonts to be extremely harsh on the eye. Probably the best change I've ever made to my programming environment.

Despite having a different proposition and use-case, FE-Schrift seems have ended up with a similar yet much more aesthetically pleasing outcome. It doesn't have lower-case, which is a deal breaker for programming at least though.

Paid, but interesting:

Pragmata Pro: http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/fsd/pragmata-pro/ Triplicate T4c: http://practicaltypography.com/triplicate.html

Something a little different:

Fantasque: https://github.com/belluzj/fantasque-sans

I use Triplicate as my standard fixed size font everywhere. I love it!

I've tried them all, Consolas included, and nothing even comes close to Dina -

http://www.donationcoder.com/Software/Jibz/Dina/index.html

† That's for Windows, not Macs.

I'm a big fan of Dina too. The original font is a bitmap font, however, and not all software still supports bitmap fonts. There's a working TTF version linked from here: http://chrisrickard.blogspot.co.uk/2010/03/dina-font-for-vis...

It's TTF in name only; at the right size, it's hinted so that it works just like a bitmap font. It doesn't scale.

I use it for all my terminals and IDEs on all platforms.

Dina used to be my go-to font as well but a few years ago I switched to Anonymous Pro [1] as it tends to be more recognizable at the small font sizes which I use.

[1] http://www.marksimonson.com/fonts/view/anonymous-pro

Another vote for Anonymous Pro.

I'd consider profont much more beautiful than Dina, personally.

That's a strange feeling, huh? It's similar to how we always want more (money, vacation, etc.) in life, but when we get there we just want more again. I've had the thought about Consolas many times; "Why do I keep looking for a new one when I like Consolas?". I think the answer is that we always seek novelty, because that drives evolution.

A change in environment boosts productivity, doesn't it? I read somewhere, maybe in Peopleware, that in a lighting study, they found any change (brighter, darker) to a workplace imported productivity. The idea being that it was just the change, not really mattering what was changed.

Perhaps it reflects poorly on me, but I love novelty. Different places, new software, new languages (or improved features) - it's great. I'll get a huge boost working on a shitty desk in a cold hotel, for a week. I started learning Ruby, and while I find it revolting in a way (it's like the opposite of elegance), I'm enjoying learning it.

This must be a well known effect, as MS seems to make small but very noticeable cosmetic changes to their UIs. I feel ... something when using the older version. Something slightly beneath my conscious perception, something that changes and feels fresh when I upgrade. (Similar but not quite the same thing when I use a shitty cross platform UI that doesn't get things quite right.)

I should probably collect a few good fonts and color schemes and rotate them automatically.

And you know, it doesn't really matter when working. But the novelty is very useful to get me going. Once I'm rolling on a project, I can be in any broken environment and stay in the flow.

I could not agree more with almost everything you just said, even the Ruby bit (did the same thing, even bought a book, though I gave up a little prematurely).

The only time seeking novelty hurts me is with side projects. As soon as I get used to the project I lose site of the bigger goal, and then I just want to start a fresh, new side project.

What language would you say has elegance? I'm thinking about learning a new language.

Haskell has elegance. Quite a different kind of language if you're not used to it, though. I found it a pleasure to learn a bit of Haskell.

I've been using the X 6x13 font for about 12-13 years. Though these days I've had to switch to a TrueType one that looks the same - presumably reproducing the pixels with hand-drawn boxes...

Hack is quite nice in terms of the aspect ratio, but in common with many modern fonts it doesn't look very good at low point sizes on a ~100dpi monitor. Not exactly unexpected - nobody bothers to hint their fonts any more, and/or provide bitmap versions for low point sizes - I'm sure it takes ages anyway and most people won't care - but still a shame. I have antialiasing switched off on Windows, and Hack looks pretty horrible. But 9pt non-AA Arial Unicode MS shows delightful-looking small fonts are possible...

Looks good on a retina display though. Just need to replace all my monitors with 250+dpi ones and I'll be set!

I use Fantasque Sans Mono - I love its subtle character! https://github.com/belluzj/fantasque-sans

I use Inconsolata myself.

Same here :) I was a lucida console user for years (and before that Courier) but as I passed 40 my eyes told me it would be better to use something else. Consolas it was, and I have to admit, it's great.

I tried hack, it looked OK (in vs.net) but the 0 (zero) didn't render with the fill-in but open. That of course sucks, as for a programmer a 0 has to be different from O. Perhaps it's something related to vs.net's rendering, not sure.

Ditto. On linux I fancy terminus though.

I really like Terminus. I started using it last year and I'd be hard-pressed to switch to anything else.

Seconded. Terminus is really amazing. But I've been trying Hack for a change after many years of Terminus and I find it rather pleasing.

Here is a very different font: https://github.com/mikekchar/MUmePlusGothic

I sometimes need Japanese characters on the console, so I got in the habit of using this font. The only thing I did was return the backslash character to be an actual backslash character (rather than yen symbol, which most Japanese fonts do).

Sorry, I don't have a picture of it (and I couldn't even find a good picture because they only show Japanese characters ;-) ). It's quite a nice programmer font, but just about the opposite to Consolas. Consolas is short and wide, whereas Ume Plus is very narrow. This gives you more columns, rather than more lines. I often split my screen left and right (tests on the right hand side) and due to poor vision, I have massive fonts. This gives me a few extra columns to work with.

There seems to be an issue with its lowercase "g" (Sublime Text 3 on Windows 7): http://i.imgur.com/CWCcR60.png

Same situation here, except that it's Courier New that I always return to.

Have you looked at Courier Prime? I like it a lot. http://quoteunquoteapps.com/courierprime/

// Looks like they've added Courier Prime Code.

As a retro-computing geek who had an early contact with IBM 3278 terminals, I am very fond of their font. So much, in fact, I recreated it based on earlier bitmaps that trace their history back to a student who copied it pixel by pixel from a real terminal. May not be your piece of cake, but you can try it:

https://github.com/rbanffy/3270font

When I can't use it, Terminus is a favorite. A long time ago I added a central dot to Luxi Mono's 0 and used it as my terminal font for a long time.

Perhaps check out PragmataPro. It’s a true work of art.

http://www.fsd.it/fonts/pragmatapro.htm

A couple of other suggestions I like but nobody else ever seems to mention:

Meslo LG [1] Droid Sans Mono [2] - the version with the slashed zero

[1] https://github.com/andreberg/Meslo-Font [2] http://www.droidfonts.com/info/droid-sans-mono-fonts/

Tried liberation mono?

https://fedorahosted.org/liberation-fonts/

Check out Office Code Pro. It's a custom version of Source Code Pro, and slightly more readable in my opinion.

https://github.com/nathco/Office-Code-Pro

Tamsyn [1] made me switch from Consolas. Now I am not even looking for another font. It is so perfect. But it being a bitmapped font, I get only two sizes. But I am so happy with it that I don't even mind...

[1] http://www.fial.com/~scott/tamsyn-font/

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