It's a good open question. I'll help the discuss with a breakdown of the 3 types of instances where it will show up (which loosely defines the players responsible):

1- Mobile phone UI. The UI that's built into the handset (as with Punchcut's Qualcomm Sans in the article you mentioned). // Falls to the manufacturers and carriers.

2- Mobile web sites (like what you will see when using a mobile browser (Opera and Opera Mini, IE for Windows Mobile, Safari Mobile Version, etc., etc., etc., The list is long, tedious and the results ugly.) // Falls to the web site and content owners.

3- Fonts embedded into "after market" games, applications, themes, and content (like e-books). // Falls to the app developers and sometimes affected by the carriers who certify them.

Helvetica is used on the iphone UI propaganda, it is a custom helvetica hinted for screen?

Miguel Hernández

Latinotype. The latin alphabet, on latino hands.
http://www.latinotype.com/view_fonts.html

I fear it will develop in parallel to the overall gist of electronic gadgets: bells and whistles, instead of real functionality. I really don't want to be negative about this, and I'm prepared to be proven wrong (and even take part in a future where I'm proven wrong) but almost everything I've seen is way too concerned with "image", and not concerned enough with really helping users. A couple of weeks ago I had an encounter with Patricia Roller (founder and former CEO of Frog Design) and she seems to share this disillusionment. She actually got visibly angry at somebody who was praising the supposed "power" of his Treo.

hhp

"Image" isn't necessarily a bad thing. Saying that image isn't an important part of user experience just doesn't make sense. The bigger problem, as I've seen it, is that device manufacturers/purchasers don't understand the value of typography in creating "image". As an industry the device makers are still a little engineering focused, as opposed to experience focused. Making type look good can be expensive from a processor/memory standpoint, not to mention from a development/design standpoint. The iPhone will raise the bar in this category, whether it's successful or not.

As for the power of the Treo: it's the only mass market phone that I know of where a user can write and compile software without having to sign up for a crazy developer program that requires each application to be signed by the phone manufacturer and lots of money (I'm not sure if windows mobile requires signatures, but I'm pretty sure that windows mobile devs can't use free compilers - only pros with $$ can play). A good example of why this is powerful: how many phones have a great pixel font editor? Only the Treo, as far as I know. In the bitmap font editor category, my years old treo is light years ahead of the iPhone with its closed platform. I know that hackability doesn't always equate to user-friendliness, but user-friendliness is not the same as power.

What good is pixel font editor if the device is high res and uses ClearType like technology? It was probably more important years back with monochrome displays. All future handhelds (we'll see how long we'll have to wait) will use technologies like ClearType, which means that fonts will be vectors there too. No need for pixel editors. Processor power is doubling every 18 months, memory prices are falling down, so doors are opening here too. iPhone BTW doesn't use the highest res of all the handhelds I know about. AFAIK there's a much better display around on an iPaq. (coincidentally named with starting i?)

The bigger problem that I see here is the size of the display. Handhelds may become smaller and have higher resolution displays and being able to display FIRST CLASS type but that will definitely restrain our eyes. So the biggest advancement will still be in displays not technology behind them. How to pack a bigger display in a device of a smaller size? Or even don't pack it but project the image in space/surface somehow.

And BTW: you can develop .Net solutions for mobile devices running Windows Mobile OS. No $$ included... There's a special .Net Compact Framework that serves the purpose.

Of course "image" is important.

> device manufacturers/purchasers don’t understand the value of
> typography in creating “image”. As an industry the device
> makers are still a little engineering focused

The problem seems to be that if/when they're weened off an overly-engineering take on UI issues, they're promptly sent too close to the other extreme. Most graphic designers don't just misunderstand the engineering of typography, they have an engrained disrespect for it. We need balance. But balance is very hard to sell.

> Making type look good

Let's make type work good.

> how many phones have a great pixel font editor?

Does it do grayscale?
(BTW Robert, CT does not preclude bitmap font editing.)

Another question: I know yours doesn't, but does the new Treo
(or any other device) allow the subbing in of custom TT fonts?

Anyway, I have little experience with the Treo, or anything else.
I was just conveying what I saw as the sentiments of a very astute,
intelligent, experienced and pragmatic designer.

> How to pack a bigger display in a device of a smaller size?

E-Ink.

hhp

eInk, ePaper or whatever you call it. No matter how they name it I don't think this will be the course of the future for displaying things, because this will limit the usage of devices. And I don't think that eInk in any way shape or form will be of any usable form and packed into a really useful device in the next at least 5 years. Because processor power will be in the time of the technology so much higher, there will be completely other possibilities of interaction. Processor will be able to handle them. eInk as a ready technology will probably be a decade too late on the market to really spread.

When it finally comes out its lifespan won't be as it is with nowadays LCDs. They're here to stay with the interaction technology for as long as we will interact with computers the way we do. Even interaction changes may not change them. Take for instance Microsoft's Surface (which is BTW just an exploitation of the first step done just now by the iPhone)

Displays will definitely "go off" devices. I wondered who ever used UMTS for practical reasons and not just because it's so fancy to talk and see the other party? It's not intuitive, it's not how we think communication works. Not with a mobile device. This will change.

> I don’t think that eInk in any way shape or form will be of any usable
> form and packed into a really useful device in the next at least 5 years.

Try last year: Sony CLIÉ.
But to be fair, that doesn't take full advantage of the power of E-Ink.

hhp

All future handhelds (we’ll see how long we’ll have to wait) will use technologies like ClearType, which means that fonts will be vectors there too. No need for pixel editors.

That's what I'm hoping for. I'm also hoping for a font management program to be included in a cell phone sometime in the future. And a flying car. :)

As far as E-Ink goes, I think it will be used for larger displays than small handheld devices. Specifically signage (since it will eventually be more cost effective than LCD displays). There will always be a need for updating information quickly in a large environment.

Handheld device? You mean like a rolled-up newspaper? :-)
With E-Ink, that newspaper can be dynamic and even interactive.

hhp

With E-Ink, that newspaper can be dynamic and even interactive.

I agree. I do want to disagreee with this though:
Most graphic designers don’t just misunderstand the engineering of typography, they have an engrained disrespect for it.

But I can't. ;)

The good news: there's a large chunk of exceptions here. :-)

hhp

> Try last year: Sony CLIÉ.

Exactly what I was saying:
And I don’t think that eInk in any way shape or form will be of any usable form and packed into a really useful device in the next at least 5 years.

I should probably write: market successful device that has obvious advantage over competing products without ePaper.

The thing is that CLIE is just another handheld device. The use of eInk/ePaper doesn't really need to be there. It could be done like all the rest. ePaper will be great in applications as mentioned later: newspapers, public places... And hopefully small devices that would be able to have larger display as the dimension of device itself. That's where ePaper comes in and replaces LEDs (TFTs, OLEDs, whatever).

Also consider the development of LEDs. The biggest difference between ePaper and LEDs is the light source. If they manage to make a durable flexible LED display that integrates back light and doesn't consume too much energy, believe me, ePaper WILL BE DEAD. Light and energy are main advantages. If they don't make the resolution of it at least 2x it's bound to fail.

As I can see we are still talking the same things here.