FiraCode

> A programming font with cursive italics and ligatures is the worst idea in the world. This is absolutely horrible. BTW, I am really angry. I'm not angry, but I'm pretty sure it's objectively a bad idea. Provably, it's more difficult to read cursive fonts than, say, sans-serif monospace fonts. Not to mention that the argument that "people like different things" is just not very good. It's simply a bad design choice. Cool project, and the monospace as well as ligatures are awesome, but the cursive italics are most definitely a bust. For context, I've used Fira Code[1] for the past few years and I'm quite happy with it. Author's claim that there aren't any free clean programming fonts is also a bit bizarre; we see free fonts released all the time. [1] https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

Regarding your list, I'm not sure what specifically you mean by "font shaping", but VS Code definitely supports programming ligatures: https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode/wiki/VS-Code-Instructions

Here you go: https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

This is pretty neat. Here's the overview blog post: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/commandline/cascadia-code/ FYI, there's also the "Input" font for coding: https://input.fontbureau.com/ and of course "Fira Code" which became popular for ligatures: https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

I've been trying out a bunch of free fonts and I keep coming back to Input Mono (https://input.fontbureau.com/). Some of my favorites include: - Hack (https://sourcefoundry.org/hack/) - IBM Plex Mono (https://www.ibm.com/plex/) - Input (above) - Fira Code (only when coding JS, the only place I like ligatures) (https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode)

In terms of ligature support, as a free alternative there is FiraCode... https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

The same way as in any other font. https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

What about ligatures? I love using the Fira Code font. https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

Here's an example: https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode/issues/751

Ligatures in programming fonts usually don't want to solve the problem of character collisions. Instead they transform rather weird symbol sequences used in programing to something closer to symbols used in maths or how you would write it by hand, e.g. != becomes ≠, =< becomes ≤, or === becomes ≡. More examples are in the repo readme: https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

> If you don’t believe me, try it for 10 or 15 years nope, I still haven't ever run into the described issues. but that's not even why I disagree with the author. if I _did_ run into an issue, it absolutely wouldn't be the font's problem. this is akin to blaming a crypto algorithm for a security flaw caused by a bad implementation. fonts are software and IDEs can simply provide an option to disable ligatures. and, often, they do: in sublime: https://www.sublimetext.com/docs/3/ligatures.html in vscode: https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode/wiki/VS-Code-Instructions in atom: use CSS

Used judiciously, ligatures can help make code more readable, not less. Consider JavaScript's == and ===, and their inverses != and !==. I personally find them difficult to visually distinguish on occasion (especially the negative forms). Fira Code [0] replaces them with two-bar and three-bar equals signs (something like =, ≠, ≡, and ≢, only wider; see the link for a screenshot). I personally find these easier to distinguish from one another at a glance. I'm sure it's not for everyone, but in my opinion at least these ligatures improve readability. I'm generally a fan of Practical Typography, but this post is unnecessarily condescending. It's sort of laughable to claim that "this isn’t a matter of taste" when users are making this choice in the privacy of their own editors. [0]: https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode

Fira Code[1] because I really enjoy its aesthetic (especially the ligatures). For general purposes, I like Open Sans[2]. [1] https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode [2] https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Open+Sans

Fira Code with ligature support turned on in your editor, or GTFO. LOVE. IT. https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode