[nagyf]

Why does HN have such a bad font size? I always have to set it to 120% otherwise it's so small I can't even read it on my big ultrawide monitor.

This is the only website which I have to scale up on every computer...

[input_sh]

Just 120? I do 150% each time.

Font size is set to really low (titles on the homepage are 10px, comments are even smaller).

I can read it fine at 100%, it just requires a bit more mental struggle in the age where font sizes are usually in 16/18px range.

[spideymans]

Gosh, I'm happy I'm not the only one. I have 20/20 vision, yet I have to turn up the HN font size on all my devices. It's the only site I've had to do this.

[beltsazar]

In addition to zooming in to 110%, I also apply this CSS for increasing the line spacing and decreasing the number of words per line:

    div.comment {
        line-height: 1.5
    }

    td {
        max-width: 700px;
    }

It improves the readability a lot for me.

[dmos62]

My 1440p monitor works ok with HN's defaults.

[gruez]

Do you have eyesight issues and/or a high dpi display? I'm using a ~105 ppi display and it works fine with regular font size.

[jlarocco]

I do have a high DPI display, and HN is ridiculously tiny without manually overriding, because it's setting text size in pixels instead of points, for no good reason. It doesn't make any sense. View source shows:

    line-height:12pt; height:10px;

Why use device independent units for line-height, but not the text itself?

[gruez]

>setting text size in pixels instead of points

"px" in css doesn't correspond to literal pixels on the display.

>By definition, this is the physical size of a single pixel at a pixel density of 96 DPI, located an arm's length away from the viewer's eyes.

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Glossary/CSS_pixel

[q-rews]

As opposed to using points? That makes no sense. Every single CSS unit just maps to a fixed value in pixels[1], from em to % and cm.

The only reason why they're in pt is that who wrote the stylesheet didn't know any better.

1: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Learn/CSS/Building_...

[gruez]

>As opposed to using points? That makes no sense.

Seems like you're replying to the wrong comment. The comment you're replying to is my comment arguing against using "pixels instead of points".

[q-rews]

No, im replying to this

>> setting text size in pixels instead of points

> "px" in css doesn't correspond to literal pixels on the display.

You ”justified” (I don’t know the intent of your comment, really) the use of points because pixels don’t match physical pixels.

> The comment you're replying to is my comment arguing against using "pixels instead of points".

Are you really arguing that using points is better than pixels on the web? Now that’s a brand new opinion.

1 point is always 1.33px. You’re still using pixels but indirectly.

[jlarocco]

Thank you. It seems "px" is really the worst of both worlds, then.

It's not device independent like "pt", it's not what most people expect it to be (one device pixel), and there's subjective "wiggle room" in what it actually means.

[gruez]

>It's not device independent like "pt", it's not what most people expect it to be (one device pixel), and there's subjective "wiggle room" in what it actually means.

This seems to also be incorrect. px and pt are both absolute units, and 1.33px == 1pt. If you want relative units you need to use something like em.

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Learn/CSS/Building_...

[dmos62]

em and rem are relative to properties on other nodes in the document's CSS hierarchy; they're not relative to some screen-size specific metric.

I've not studied the topic in any depth, but I believe that an adaptive ruleset would just use CSS media queries (use this font size when viewport width is more than something). That is what Bootstrap does. Or, use viewport-relative units like vw, vh, vmin, vmax, but I doubt that would work well.

[swiley]

This. Only Microsoft thinks these are subjective.

[spicybright]

lol, an arms length. That's like when people used to measure feet by using an actual foot.

[jrochkind1]

My "eyesight issue" is being older than 40 ha! It'll happen to you too youngster!

[adamc]

Might be an age issue. When you get older, small font sizes are problematic. It's rude of sites to use them, IMO.

[tomc1985]

Personally I hate large font sizes. What do they think I am, 5?

[q-rews]

It depends on how large. 16/18px is a good default for body copy. IFTTT is just taking the piss, I visit it at 70% or less.

[OJFord]

I have a 123ppi display, normal is ok but I have it zoomed out to 80 or 90%.

People are different, so it's good to have font size and zoom options. Some can go bigger, some can go smaller. I use 80% on a lot of sites, and an extension called 'Zoom Page WE' to remember the settings.

[q-rews]

Because HN is not "designed" as much as it's just been written by dinosaurs who visit it via Lynx. My browser is currently at 150% and I'm basically a millennial.

The smallest font on this page is 9px, that's just ludicrous.

I mean just open the CSS file and judge for yourself.