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Maniphest T176636

Unify CSS font stack of monospace-styled elements across products
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Description

Our CSS font stack of monospace styled elements varies across web products without reason.
We should unify rules to one approach, best probably font-family: monospace, monospace as used in normalize.css.

Background of this CSS value is to tackle different cross-browser monospace font sizing quirks, see detailed explanation.

Original comparison by @matmarex in T175709#3630249

These two versions are exactly equivalent, I don't think we've been using any of the possible variants of this hack consistently. I grepped core and extensions and found the following number of usages:

RuleUsages
font-family: monospace, 'Courier';18
font-family: monospace, monospace;8
font-family: monospace, fixed;2
font-family: monospace, 'Courer New';1

Also, @Edokter has introduced a MW core comparison at T35496: Misleading comment regarding preformatted font in commonElements.css

Details

SubjectRepoBranchLines +/-
Unify monospace font stack. Avoid potential sizing bug caused by weird browser behavior with `font-family: monospace;`mediawiki/extensions/CodeMirrormaster+8 -1
Standardize editfont size across browsers/OSesmediawiki/coremaster+8 -1
Unify monospace font family stackmediawiki/coremaster+2 -6
Update VE core submodule to master (84ec68dfb)mediawiki/extensions/VisualEditormaster+1 -1
Unify monospace font family stackmediawiki/extensions/CentralNoticemaster+1 -1
Add `font-family-monospace` variablewikimedia-ui-basemaster+2 -0
Unify monospace font family stackmediawiki/extensions/VisualEditormaster+9 -6
Unify monospace font family stackVisualEditor/VisualEditormaster+20 -14
Unify monospace font family stackmediawiki/skins/MinervaNeuemaster+2 -1
Unify monospace font family stackmediawiki/coremaster+2 -1
Customize query in gerrit

Related Objects

Event Timeline

Volker_E created this task.Sep 25 2017, 2:06 PM
Restricted Application added a project: UI-Standardization. · View Herald TranscriptSep 25 2017, 2:06 PM
Restricted Application added a subscriber: Aklapper. · View Herald Transcript
Jdlrobson moved this task from Backlog to Blocked on the MinervaNeue board.Sep 25 2017, 2:10 PM
Volker_E mentioned this in T175709: Which tags in MediaWiki should be styled as monospace?.Sep 25 2017, 2:10 PM
gerritbot subscribed.Sep 25 2017, 2:28 PM

Change 380518 had a related patch set uploaded (by VolkerE; owner: VolkerE):
[wikimedia-ui-base@master] Add font-family-monospace variable

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380518

gerritbot added a project: Patch-For-Review.Sep 25 2017, 2:28 PM
Volker_E updated the task description. (Show Details)Sep 25 2017, 2:32 PM
Volker_E added a subscriber: Edokter.
gerritbot added a comment.Sep 25 2017, 2:39 PM

Change 380522 had a related patch set uploaded (by VolkerE; owner: VolkerE):
[mediawiki/skins/MinervaNeue@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380522

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 25 2017, 2:47 PM

Change 380523 had a related patch set uploaded (by VolkerE; owner: VolkerE):
[mediawiki/extensions/CentralNotice@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380523

Diffusion mentioned this in rWMUI2c72718738b7: Add `font-family-monospace` variable.Sep 25 2017, 3:01 PM
gerritbot added a comment.Sep 25 2017, 3:08 PM

Change 380526 had a related patch set uploaded (by VolkerE; owner: VolkerE):
[mediawiki/core@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380526

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 25 2017, 5:45 PM

Change 380526 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/core@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380526

ReleaseTaggerBot added a project: MW-1.31-release-notes (WMF-deploy-2017-09-26 (1.31.0-wmf.1)).Sep 25 2017, 6:00 PM
gerritbot added a comment.Sep 27 2017, 8:57 PM

Change 380522 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/skins/MinervaNeue@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380522

ReleaseTaggerBot edited projects, added MW-1.31-release-notes (WMF-deploy-2017-10-03 (1.31.0-wmf.2)); removed MW-1.31-release-notes (WMF-deploy-2017-09-26 (1.31.0-wmf.1)).Sep 27 2017, 9:00 PM
gerritbot added a comment.Sep 27 2017, 10:15 PM

Change 381138 had a related patch set uploaded (by VolkerE; owner: VolkerE):
[VisualEditor/VisualEditor@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381138

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 27 2017, 10:25 PM

Change 381142 had a related patch set uploaded (by VolkerE; owner: VolkerE):
[mediawiki/extensions/VisualEditor@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381142

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 27 2017, 10:37 PM

Change 381138 merged by jenkins-bot:
[VisualEditor/VisualEditor@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381138

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 27 2017, 10:40 PM

Change 381145 had a related patch set uploaded (by VolkerE; owner: VolkerE):
[mediawiki/core@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381145

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 27 2017, 10:41 PM

Change 381142 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/extensions/VisualEditor@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381142

Volker_E moved this task from Backlog to Doing… on the UI-Standardization-Kanban board.Sep 27 2017, 10:41 PM
gerritbot added a comment.Sep 28 2017, 8:48 AM

Change 380518 merged by jenkins-bot:
[wikimedia-ui-base@master] Add font-family-monospace variable

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380518

• Prtksxna subscribed.Sep 28 2017, 8:50 AM
From the description :

Background of this CSS value is to tackle different cross-browser monospace font sizing quirks, see detailed explanation.

A quick summary (incase github goes away):

Major web browsers reduce the text size of elements whose font-family property is explicitly set to monospace to account for the greater width of many monospace typefaces in comparison to other fonts at the same text height - http://code.stephenmorley.org/html-and-css/fixing-browsers-broken-monospace-font-handling/
Since they are checking explicitly for a computed value of monospace, other fixes may be applied, such as monospace,serif or _,monospace, if we feel one of those or something similar would be more readable.

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 28 2017, 5:23 PM

Change 380523 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/extensions/CentralNotice@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/380523

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 28 2017, 5:55 PM

Change 381269 had a related patch set uploaded (by Jforrester; owner: Jforrester):
[mediawiki/extensions/VisualEditor@master] Update VE core submodule to master (4fac129ce)

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381269

gerritbot added a comment.Sep 29 2017, 4:39 PM

Change 381269 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/extensions/VisualEditor@master] Update VE core submodule to master (84ec68dfb)

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381269

Esanders mentioned this in T182320: Fix textarea editor's edit font size.Dec 7 2017, 1:09 PM
gerritbot added a comment.Dec 7 2017, 1:38 PM

Change 396005 had a related patch set uploaded (by Esanders; owner: Esanders):
[mediawiki/core@master] Standardize editfont size across browsers/OSes

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/396005

gerritbot added a comment.Dec 19 2017, 10:34 PM

Change 396005 had a related patch set uploaded (by Bartosz Dziewoński; owner: Esanders):
[mediawiki/core@master] Standardize editfont size across browsers/OSes

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/396005

gerritbot added a comment.Dec 19 2017, 10:41 PM

Change 381145 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/core@master] Unify monospace font family stack

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/381145

ReleaseTaggerBot edited projects, added MW-1.31-release-notes (WMF-deploy-2018-01-02 (1.31.0-wmf.15)); removed MW-1.31-release-notes (WMF-deploy-2017-10-03 (1.31.0-wmf.2)).Dec 19 2017, 11:00 PM
gerritbot added a comment.Dec 20 2017, 1:25 AM

Change 396005 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/core@master] Standardize editfont size across browsers/OSes

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/396005

Volker_E closed this task as Resolved.Dec 20 2017, 1:26 AM
Volker_E claimed this task.
Volker_E removed a project: Patch-For-Review.
Volker_E removed a subscriber: gerritbot.
Volker_E moved this task from Doing… to Done on the UI-Standardization-Kanban board.Dec 20 2017, 1:39 AM
• Demian added a parent task: T244425: Typography: documentation of research and decisions.Feb 10 2020, 3:25 PM
• Demian removed a parent task: T244425: Typography: documentation of research and decisions.Feb 10 2020, 7:29 PM
• Demian mentioned this in T244425: Typography: documentation of research and decisions.
• Demian mentioned this in T244803: Typography: Rethinking the monospace font stack (source code typography): proposing commonly used fonts tailored for developers.Feb 10 2020, 10:53 PM
• Demian mentioned this in T245476: [SPIKE] How to make source editors' font-size responsive.Feb 18 2020, 1:54 PM
gerritbot added a comment.Feb 20 2020, 2:50 AM

Change 573427 had a related patch set uploaded (by Aron Manning; owner: Aron Manning):
[mediawiki/extensions/CodeMirror@master] Unify monospace font stack. Avoid potential sizing bug caused by weird browser behavior with font-family: momonospace;

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/573427

gerritbot added a project: Patch-For-Review.Feb 20 2020, 2:50 AM
gerritbot added a comment.Feb 29 2020, 1:19 PM

Change 573427 merged by jenkins-bot:
[mediawiki/extensions/CodeMirror@master] Unify monospace font stack. Avoid potential sizing bug caused by weird browser behavior with font-family: monospace;

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/573427

ReleaseTaggerBot added a project: MW-1.35-notes (1.35.0-wmf.22; 2020-03-03).Feb 29 2020, 2:00 PM
Od1n mentioned this in T192373: Width of "Input wikitext" textfield on Special:ExpandTemplates is different from normal.May 7 2020, 7:05 AM
Od1n updated the task description. (Show Details)May 7 2020, 7:07 AM
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