I need a cursive font or two for a website

[backslashbaby]

Has anyone had success with a pretty cursive font that plays nicely with most browsers? I generally get to avoid cursive.

I'm looking for something a little formal. Just nice-looking, easy to read, and more formal than very handwritten-looking cursive.

I'm using CSS, but if something else can give me what I want I'd definitely be interested.

Thanks!

[Matera the Mad]

You can't use any font on a website that is not installed on the computer of the person viewing that site. It has nothing to do with what web browser they use. Stick with fonts that are installed with Windows. Of course that leaves out the Mac and Linux people.... If you must have something fancy for headings, you have to create an image using that font.

[backslashbaby]

Thanks Are there any suggestions for Windows cursive fonts folks have used? Is there a good cursive one for both Mac/Win? I'm finding a lot of advice to avoid cursive, darnit. I really have to try to find something

I was just looking at using images for navigation, lol. That's no problem. Still, for the body text I'd love to use a font if I could at all. Best I'm doing so far is Palantino. I'll see if that's close enough, but if anyone has a different suggestion, plmk

[Matera the Mad]

Google is your friend

[backslashbaby]

Yes, I've researched what the thousands of yahoos on teh interwebs do

This is a favorites question, a question of taste and/or experience. Different browsers display cursive strangely oftentimes, so it's just not what I've worked with before.

I hoped we had web programmers who used many different fonts on many different platforms, but that's cool. No favorite fonts then

[Medievalist]

There are three things you can try, via CSS.

1. List Lucida Handwriting for Windows users, (lots of Mac users will have it too, since it ships with Microsoft products), and Zapfino for Mac users
2. List Zapf Chancery for a third option
3. For the font class in the CSS list Cursive.

See this page:

http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS2/fonts.html

Keep in mind that local browser settings in the user's Web browser override anything in HTML or CSS.

ETA: I suspect the advice to avoid cursive is meant to be helpful--it can be hard to read, especially for body text.

[backslashbaby]

Excellent! Thank you. Yeah, I'll have a few backup fonts listed - got that covered

Eta: on the override thing, yes, thankyou. That sucks, but I test it with various fonts to make sure it degrades well.

[charlotte49ers]

I can't stand the Windows cursive options. If I need new fonts, I download free ones off of dafont.com. If I were going to use cursive on the web, though, I would be very selective, ya know? Like signatures, maybe categories, but make sure it's not too scripty (like Scriptina, or something...that's hard to read).

[backslashbaby]

I agree! I won't go as crazy as those signature-type fonts, but the client wants something romantic and formal. There isn't a lot of text, thank God

[Kathleen42]

My two cents as a designer: I wouldn't use cursive outside of images. There's just more of a chance you'll run into issues. IMO.

[Matera the Mad]

Clients should get into their pointy heads the facts of life about who owns teh internetz. We the viewers can see whatever we want. We can choose our fonts and colors, we can ignore background images, we can block Flash. If I weren't a webdesecrator myself, the only font I'd see in my browser would be Tahoma. But I have to let horrible stuff come through in order to check my own work accurately. It's almost worth the bother of using separate profiles in my very portable default browser.