[OpenFontLibrary] @font-face, is it really needed for font preview?

[Khaled Hosny]

The new OFLB website uses @font-face CSS property for font preview, but
I wonder if we really need it? Most browsers don't support it, even with
the release of Firefox 3.1 we still have around 70% of web users with
browsers that don't support it. Even if we put this aside, why I need to
download a several megabits font just to get a static preview of it, it
isn't even dynamic, what is the benefit (some Arabic or CJK fonts are
even larger). Don't get me wrong, I find @font-face very great feature,
but I think we are misusing it here.

I think generating server side previews gives more better and responsive
user experience, I think "font playground" already does this, just we
need to merge it into the "main body" of the page instead of the current
hidden (and annoying) separate popup (or whatever it is called).

Regards,
 Khaled

-- 
 Khaled Hosny
 Arabic localizer and member of Arabeyes.org team
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 197 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
Url : http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/openfontlibrary/attachments/20090209/5a6d4c61/attachment.pgp