The I ogonek in sans-serif monospaced typefaces

Melvian

The rules for drawing and positioning diacritics have been very clearly laid out in a variety of resources, for the most common and important styles of typefaces. However, I haven't seen any such resource address the recommended way to handle the positioning of the ogonek in the uppercase and lowercase 'I' of a sans-serif monospaced typeface.

Should I position the ogonek at the stem (1), respecting the tradition of positioning the ogonek in a serif 'I'? Or should I position it near the right edge of the serif (2), given that, in a monospaced sans-serif, the serifs are basically part of the letter's core structure?



I also looked at what other foundries were doing, and saw different foundries take different positions on this. For instance, ABC Dinamo, Klim (mostly), Production Type, and the fonts Fira Mono and Input Mono take option 1, while OH no Type (except Degular Mono), Mass-Driver, XYZ Type (Aglet Mono), Arrow Type, and Commercial Type (Delegate Mono and Atlas Typewriter) take option 2.

(Some fonts, like the Pitch fonts, take an option "1.5", where the ogonek is positioned somewhere in-between.)

What is your take on these design choices? What would you do, and why?

John Hudson

In a barred I design in a font targeting a European lannguage like Lithuanian, my inclination would be your option 2. This follows a norm for ogonek positioning and ductus in European writing and type. Basically, you would treat the bottom bar of the I exactly like the bottom stroke of Ę.

However, if you want your font to target a broader use of the ogonek in North American indigenous orthographies, then optically centering it as in option 1 is a better default.

Nick Shinn

It depends on the genre of typeface.
If it’s chirographic, put the squiggle over to the right, as it may have been written at the letter’s ending.
If it’s more “geometric,” put it in the middle.
Also, consider how the acute and grave are positioned—are they centred, or do they leap out from the centre towards one side? Decide whether to harmonize with these.  
It really doesn’t matter, from the reader’s perspective or for “readability,” the only people who care are other type designers—and you yourself. 

By the way, there are no “rules” for diacritics, only conventions.

Melvian

Thank you for your responses, very insightful!

John Hudson said:

However, if you want your font to target a broader use of the ogonek in North American indigenous orthographies, then optically centering it as in option 1 is a better default.

Huh, that's interesting! I don't know too much about that stuff. If one wanted to target those orthographies, how many more glyphs would you have to draw for a typeface to be useful in that regard? Or is it practically like drawing whole new scripts?

Nick Shinn said:

It really doesn’t matter, from the reader’s perspective or for “readability,” the only people who care are other type designers—and you yourself.

In the greater scheme of things, sure. I just wanted to see if anyone had any particular thoughts on this.

Nick Shinn said:

By the way, there are no “rules” for diacritics, only conventions.

I think instinctively I knew that but I'll keep that in mind!

John Hudson

If one wanted to target those orthographies, how many more glyphs would you have to draw for a typeface to be useful in that regard? Or is it practically like drawing whole new scripts?

I’ll be able to provide a detailed practical answer to that question when a project goes live in the next few weeks. Most of the Latin script orthographies of North American indigenous languages are derived from the Americanist Phonetic Alphabet.

Typotheque provide an introduction to some general features.

Melvian

Okay cool, can't wait to see the project! Thanks for the Typotheque link.

Kent Lew

If your target is limited only to those that happen to use the į (primarily languages in the Na-Dene and Athabaskan families), then the list of additional glyphs is not terribly daunting or complex. But you’ll likely want to include localized variants with centered components for the other ogonek characters as well — ĄąĘęŲų (Ǫǫ is usually centered regardless). You’ll also need to pay extra attention to {mark} and {mkmk} anchors & features, since many graphemes are not single codepoints.

However, if you aim to provide more comprehensive support for the wider range of languages across the various North American First Nations then, as John indicated, you’ll find yourself wandering into IPA territory, with many less familiar glyphs — some Greek-derived, some unusually modified, additional accents, etc. 

Some of these can be more challenging to manage, especially across any extensive weight range (e.g., ƛ ɬ ɫ ɣ Ⱥ Ɇ Ⱦ, to list a few). Some of these language communities also still have evolving orthographies and/or inconsistent practices (e.g. use of ¢ vs ȼ, or commaabovecomb [uni0313] vs commaaboverightcomb [uni0315]).

So, it quickly becomes a slippery slope down a rabbit hole, speaking from personal experience. 🙄

I’m very much looking forward to the guidance and conclusions that John has been working on.

Melvian

Good to know! Indigenous languages aren't something that I'm targeting yet, but I definitely want to experiment with that in the future.