Embedded Fonts: Keep or Remove?

[JSWolf]

The only time I used embedded body fonts was back when I had a Sony Reader and they used fake italics. Looked terrible.

Now I remove the body fonts as I've not found any I like or need. But for other embedded fonts, I decide if I want to keep them or not. If sans-serif fonts are used and they are (to me) nothing special, I'll replace them with the default sans-serif font(s). If I like them enough, I'll keep them. Sometimes some fonts are used for handwriting and I'll keep those unless they aren't good enough for eInk and then I'll look for a similar font to replace.

I cannot recall needing an embedded body font to display anything that cannot be displayed since I created ChareInk6. Now it's ChareInk7SP and some other variants.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by enuddleyarbl

I've actually run into a similar problem once or twice. Things looked fine in Calibre's editor/viewer. But, when I read the book on my Kobo, there was just a blank space where a particular word/name was supposed to be. But, in those cases, I messed around in the editor again until I could get something that showed up in the Kobo.

Those missing glyphs were one of the reasons I created my original Font Tester ePub file. I was reading David Weber's Wargod series on my original Kobo (the one that worked with a Blackberry's Bluetooth connection) and a lot of the names in the book had the .notdef glyph making names such as Shīgū, Tomanāk, Sothōi, Hŭrăka, Zŭrăk, Ǣtesk & Œ̄tesk a bit of a pain to read.

At this time, I keep special case embedded files (such as an Enochia font for Terry Pratchett's Golem books) but toss out body font and cursive fonts used to chapter headings or dropcaps.

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I cannot recall needing an embedded body font to display anything that cannot be displayed since I created ChareInk6. Now it's ChareInk7SP and some other variants.

There are quite a few Hellenic alphabet characters that Charis 7 does not support and I have used an embedded and subsetted font to handle those since one series I read loved to use Greek quotes in the original and then in translation.

[Solitaire1]

When it comes to EPUB ebooks, I just leave them as is. A concern I have is that if I start making changes like removing fonts I might break something in the ebook. I've found that the embedded fonts usually work okay for me, and if it doesn't then I override it with the on-ereader fonts.

[JSWolf]

I find most embedded fonts (for the main body text) don't work well enough with eInk.

[enuddleyarbl]

I've gone through roughly 100 books that have (had) embedded fonts. Three of them have some meaningful reason for the embedded fonts. The rest of the fonts were there mostly to support the advertising pages the publisher added to the books (and I removed). But, some of the fonts were body fonts in one form or another.

Thinking about this some more, I realized that I might have a problem with keeping specified/embedded fonts in the books. I read kepubs on a Kobo. My understanding is that if I select a particular font in the Kobo's Aa menu, that font will be used regardless of anything specified/embedded in the kepub. Only if I select Publisher Default will any specified/embedded font in the kepub be used. But, in that case, what font will the Kobo use for unspecified body text?

Assuming I want to keep it set to Publisher Default to see those few cases that benefit from embedded fonts, should I change my body CSS in my stylesheet to include a serif font (assuming a serif font is the best for body text)?

body {
/* Basic Styling for BODY Section of a File */
	height:	100%;
	margin:	0;
	orphans:	1;
	padding:	0;
	widows:	1;
	font-family:	serif;
}

Should I include more than the generic "serif" in the font-family? What would be a good specific and fallback body font for the Sage?

[Solitaire1]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I find most embedded fonts (for the main body text) don't work well enough with eInk.

Based on my experience, although Garamond has been as a font, I've found it to be thin on my ebook reader (Nook Glowlight 4). A font I've found that works much better on my ebook reader is Bookman Old Style, which doesn't have the thin look of Garamond, while also being a bit larger than Times New Roman at the size point size, and the numbers are all the same height, unlike Georgia (while I like the way the letters look, the numbers make it a no-go for me).

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by enuddleyarbl

I've gone through roughly 100 books that have (had) embedded fonts. Three of them have some meaningful reason for the embedded fonts. The rest of the fonts were there mostly to support the advertising pages the publisher added to the books (and I removed). But, some of the fonts were body fonts in one form or another.

Thinking about this some more, I realized that I might have a problem with keeping specified/embedded fonts in the books. I read kepubs on a Kobo. My understanding is that if I select a particular font in the Kobo's Aa menu, that font will be used regardless of anything specified/embedded in the kepub. Only if I select Publisher Default will any specified/embedded font in the kepub be used. But, in that case, what font will the Kobo use for unspecified body text?

Assuming I want to keep it set to Publisher Default to see those few cases that benefit from embedded fonts, should I change my body CSS in my stylesheet to include a serif font (assuming a serif font is the best for body text)?

body {
/* Basic Styling for BODY Section of a File */
	height:	100%;
	margin:	0;
	orphans:	1;
	padding:	0;
	widows:	1;
	font-family:	serif;
}

Should I include more than the generic "serif" in the font-family? What would be a good specific and fallback body font for the Sage?

There is no need to specify any font for the body font. Just pick the one you want to use from the list in the Aa menu.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Solitaire1

Based on my experience, although Garamond has been as a font, I've found it to be thin on my ebook reader (Nook Glowlight 4). A font I've found that works much better on my ebook reader is Bookman Old Style, which doesn't have the thin look of Garamond, while also being a bit larger than Times New Roman at the size point size, and the numbers are all the same height, unlike Georgia (while I like the way the letters look, the numbers make it a no-go for me).

Garamond is a terrible font for eInk screens. The problem is that it's used in pBooks/ It gets embedded because the publisher wants the eBook to look like the pBook.

[Readirect]

Kill them fonts dead, Son: They do nothing but waste space at best; behave badly at worst.

And while we're on the subject of clueless publishers: Ya know those drop down letters and whatnot which sometimes appear at the start of a chapter, as decoration? They might look interesting on paper but all they do in e-books is mess up formatting. Kill them, too.

Then there are all those ginormous jpg's of smiling authors, which publishers seem to think readers care about at the cost of unnecessary mb's of storage. No, a**holes, we don't. So kill them, too.

Then add to the kill list all those equally large jpg's of the author's other book covers which publishers also love to include. No reason for their existence; they are as worthless as the e-book designer who decided they were a good idea.

Unless the object is absolutely necessary to the book -- and, no, the "feeling" which a font conveys is not necessary to the story -- it does not belong in the book AND you can save a ton of storage on your device by eliminating them:

To do all this, turn Calibre into a killing machine with its Edit Book command. Select it and you'll see the e-book's categories on the left. Delete all styles, fonts and non-essential graphics in those categories.

Each of those deleted files will generate an error for remaining content which refers to them. You can ignore those errors, you're e-reader certainly will. If you're the anal retentive sort, though, there's also an option in Edit Book to check the e-book for errors, after you go all Dexter on the file. Run that; you'll likely see a bunch of errors and, if you do, you'll also see an option to automatically fix those errors. Do that and most of them -- including all of consequence -- will be fixed.

In fact, IMO publishers who treat YOUR storage on YOUR device as THEIR personal playground are the main reason purchasers must be allowed to edit e-books: Copy-protected books should not be allowed to exist as long as clueless pigs continue to create content which begs to be deleted.

[Solitaire1]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Garamond is a terrible font for eInk screens. The problem is that it's used in pBooks/ It gets embedded because the publisher wants the eBook to look like the pBook.

What I'd rather see when it comes to fonts on ebooks is a general font description, like "Serif" or "San Serif" rather than specific font, and then allow the User to choose the font on their ereader. Also, make it easy to add fonts so that Users can add fonts they like for reading.

I had a similar issue with my first ebook reader, a Sony PRS-500. Although I liked it, I had an issue with the fonts, specifically with RTFs (on of the formats it supported). The problem I had was that you couldn't predict what type would be displayed. It would have been fine if they had designed it so that if you open an RTF file on the ereader it would display in a serif or a san serif font. But instead, you couldn't tell how the text would appear.

[Turtle91]

Well.... I know that children's books are probably not high on most people's reading lists here... But, I know my kids and grandkids actually really like seeing the different fonts that show the story as I am reading it to them... A dragon's scribble in their notepad, or the haunting voice of the ghost. It gives them a thrill and keeps them interested in reading...so I do find that some fonts are worth it.

Others may have the same feeling when they are reading (whether they admit to it or not! ) You also don't need to worry about other people's device memory since this thread is supposedly about cleaning up other people's work for your own use??

So... I still recommend to check what the font is being used for before just ripping them out!