How widely supported are smallcaps?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by phillipgessert

What’s nuts is I could swear I’ve seen that specific measure before. I want to say it’s either an InDesign default or a popular answer to a StackOverflow question about faked smallcaps. In any case, it’d drive me nuts to have something that specific in a stylesheet. It’d bug me as something that just felt arbitrary.

Lot of comedy here but apparently I gotta spread karma around more before I can acknowledge it.

And I'm reasonably sure that somewhere in time, I've used that myself, but...I admit, it's back in the recesses somewhere.

Meh. We've all (most likely, at least, those of us in commercial hell) done this or that to make a faux-small-cap. I know I've used something like it, ir not damned near identical. Clients, amirite?

(Jon, you may as well grovel now. They're not gonna let this go, you know that, right?)

Hitch

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by phillipgessert

In any case, it’d drive me nuts to have something that specific in a stylesheet. It’d bug me as something that just felt arbitrary.

Well, it's just 5/6, rounded to 4 decimal places, i.e., make the font 1/6th smaller, and the inverse of 120% (0.8333*1.20 = 1). Now, 0.8342, that would be arbitrary

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Jellby

Well, it's just 5/6, rounded to 4 decimal places, i.e., make the font 1/6th smaller, and the inverse of 120% (0.8333*1.20 = 1). Now, 0.8342, that would be arbitrary

LOL.

This entire group has lost its collective minds. (Or would that be collective mind? Hmmm...inquiring minds want to know...I'm pretty sure it's mind, not minds, but...whatever.)

Hitch

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Hitch

LOL.

This entire group has lost its collective minds. (Or would that be collective mind? Hmmm...inquiring minds want to know...I'm pretty sure it's mind, not minds, but...whatever.)

Hitch

Are you sure we even had our minds?

[JSWolf]

Hitch, when you do simulated smallcaps, what size do you use?

[Quoth]

I remove small caps when I find them in ebooks I get. I regard it as a feature for paper. At least ebooks aren't all one font and no indents like on a 160x160 pixel Palm PDA.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Are you sure we even had our minds?

Uh, nope. I was startled to realize that I've been here with you loonies for what, a dozen years now? Damn, it's a miracle I have any braincells left to burn.

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Hitch, when you do simulated smallcaps, what size do you use?

I don't. We don't do simulated s/cs anymore. Either we have a smallcaps font, or we don't; if we don't have a s/c font that we can embed, we'll do something else. Bold incipits, italics...whatevs. The disparities in what the newer Ks would do, versus old K/mobi was just too much to look even half-baked decent, so...

Originally Posted by Quoth

I remove small caps when I find them in ebooks I get. I regard it as a feature for paper. At least ebooks aren't all one font and no indents like on a 160x160 pixel Palm PDA.

Meh, that's your personal preference. I see so few that are well done that I just ignore them. LOL.

I agree on the old Palm PDA!! We should all realize, those days weren't so long ago and be appreciative.

Hitch

[Karellen]

Originally Posted by Hitch

I don't. We don't do simulated s/cs anymore. Either we have a smallcaps font, or we don't; if we don't have a s/c font that we can embed, we'll do something else. Bold incipits, italics...whatevs. The disparities in what the newer Ks would do, versus old K/mobi was just too much to look even half-baked decent, so...

Hi @Hitch

Which smallcaps font do you use that would match the default font in the Libra 2? Can you recommend one?

If you avoid smallcaps, what do you use instead for the following examples?

It was 3 p.m. do you use p.m. / P.M. / P.M. (smallcaps)

How about for inline situations like...

The headline read LAWYER SUED FOR MALPRACTICE, which was an understatement in itself... would you just italic the headline text or use another method?

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Karellen

Hi @Hitch

Which smallcaps font do you use that would match the default font in the Libra 2? Can you recommend one?

Generally, no. Not to be unhelpful, but 99% of the time, we're using the fonts that were requested/licensed by the publisher. (Given my druthers, I prefer, all things being equal, to stick with regular caps for portability, given what we all see, over and over. But the problem with that is, they fail badly, see below.)

Now...you realize most of our customers would have cows around that, just using caps, so ...assume stuff like Garamond SC in a G book and the like. There are regular caps fonts that you can use, too. (Latin modern, for example). I don't know a Libra 2 well enough to answer this; Jon probably does. I really hate to sound like I'm being cute or coy--I'm not.

If you avoid smallcaps, what do you use instead for the following examples?

It was 3 p.m. do you use p.m. / P.M. / P.M. (smallcaps)

We DO use small-caps, but I tend to assume that they fall back to caps. Using other methods has a poor failure option, like sizing and all that. One of the few advantages of using a small-cap font, however, is just that--you can code it to use the UC letters, and so then, when/if the font fails, you at least get uppercase in the default font. That to me is the best alternative.

And you can't really code a fallback for the fail, b/c at least in the Kindleverse, it doesn't "know" if it's displaying Garamond, Bookerly, Helvetica, etc. Right? So, your best bet is to code the small-caps font, upper-case, and then the fallback font and hope for the best. Although, as far as I know, nobody has died from seeing "12:00PM" typed out as "12:00pm." :-)

How about for inline situations like...

The headline read LAWYER SUED FOR MALPRACTICE, which was an understatement in itself... would you just italic the headline text or use another method?

I prefer to just go with bold or bold UC as in:

The headline read LAWYER SUED FOR MALPRACTICE, which was an understatement in itself... would you just italic the headline text or use another method?[/QUOTE]

It's hard to go wrong with that. While we typo nerds all love the elegant stuff--and let's fess up, we do--the point is to make it readable for the reader, right? To convey the text. I love me some drop caps. I love my boxed caps, when suitable. I love all sorts of gee-gaws and fleurons and stuff, in their right places and spots. But..no gee-gaw ever made me cry (okay, let me rephrase that. No geegaw or fleuron in a book I bought, ever made me laugh or cry. Books that my team will occasionally make as a draft, or fleurons that a customer has brought me, sure, they've brought me bawling to my knees!), nor made me laugh nor remember a book. The BOOK does that.

My job, as pitiful as it might be, is to do my best to enhance the reader's journey or understanding of that text. Not...not try to insert myself and interfere, if that makes sense, as to how I feel about it?

So, in summary--and I apologize for rambling here a bit and maybe even contradicting myself (taking some unusual meds here....), all things being equal, smallcaps u/c font, fallback to regular upper-case, is my suggestion. I don't think you can plan for all eventualities and I don't think that there's One SmallCap To Rule Them All, but I will ask the Minions when I next see them and revert. They know that end better than I do, these days.

Hitch

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Karellen

The headline read LAWYER SUED FOR MALPRACTICE, which was an understatement in itself... would you just italic the headline text or use another method?

The few times I've dealt with similar chunks of text, I've bolded the headline and set the size to 90% just to make it a bit less obtrusive.

LAWYER SUED FOR MALPRACTICE
LAWYER SUED FOR MALPRACTICE

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Does anyone have a better value then 0.8333em that works in more cases then not?

And around we go.

I myself wouldn't use anything bigger than 0.83325em

[Turtle91]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

And around we go.

I myself wouldn't use anything bigger than 0.83325em

I'm soooo disappointed....I've looked up to you for so long - but that is a deal breaker.

MAX: 0.833248em

[Quoth]

0.83em
I'm a lazy typist.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Uh, nope. I was startled to realize that I've been here with you loonies for what, a dozen years now? Damn, it's a miracle I have any braincells left to burn.

I know I am and glad you've stuck around.

I don't. We don't do simulated s/cs anymore. Either we have a smallcaps font, or we don't; if we don't have a s/c font that we can embed, we'll do something else. Bold incipits, italics...whatevs. The disparities in what the newer Ks would do, versus old K/mobi was just too much to look even half-baked decent, so...

If Kobo would update the version of RMSDK, then there would be very little issue with smallcaps these days. Given that Kobo is one of the top brands, it's shameful. What I might do is make a smallcaps version of ChareInk for use with ePub.

Meh, that's your personal preference. I see so few that are well done that I just ignore them. LOL.

I'm just lazy and if there are hardly any smallcaps, I'd just leave it but change the size. I have embedded a smallcap font before where there were a lot of smallcaps..

I agree on the old Palm PDA!! We should all realize, those days weren't so long ago and be appreciative.

I started reading eBooks not too long before the PRS-500 was released. I was mostly reading LIT format because I was able to remove the DRM and I liked the formatting better in most cases.

I've never had a Blackberry/Palm PDA.

Hitch[/QUOTE]

[Karellen]

Thanks @Hitch I'll check out those couple of small caps fonts you mention and I'll try to avoid smallcaps in future. Not that it happens a lot, mainly for a.m./p.m.

Thanks @DNSB I did try bold and bold+italic but I personally found they grabbed my attention too much. My eye kept being drawn to it before I even came close to reading that section. So I stopped using it.

I also played around with using sans-serif for those few words. It was much better than bold but I noticed the sans-serif 1.0em seems to be larger than the serif 1.0em, so I had to reduce it to 0.9em, but I did prefer it to the bold.

@JSWolf I had no idea that Kobo was using an older RMSDK. Weird!!