[Sigia-l] text justification

[Meg Houston Maker]

In the days of lead type and letterpress printing, running text (for books)
was usually justified. The type was meticulously set by hand, and kerned,
tracked, and leaded to optimize legibility at standard reading distances. We
have a long way to go before this level of precision and control is afforded
by electronic displays, especially through web browsers. The justification
algorithms just don't seem up to the task, and result in choppy layouts and
uneven color on the page, especially at such a low resolution.

I stick with ragged-right layout for web text blocks, and where possible
incorporate a substantial white gutter on either side. I generally design
with elastic columns, which help folks who need to zoom the text up or down,
but I try to keep per-line word count to 12-15 for default, medium type
sizes.

Meg