Forum:Bold font weird in Firefox?

I know that browser-specific issues aren't usually something that Wikia can fix, so by asking about it here I hope that some other users who've encountered this problem (if any) might offer some insight or suggestions on how to fix it.

This is a problem I encountered a while ago: FireFox seems to have a problem rendering white or grey fonts over a dark background. The text may change color (usu. to somewhat green or yellow), becomes very crispy-edged, and is very annoying to the eyes. This is a problem on any wiki using dark backgrounds, such as most wikis I work on here. A good example would be the Company of Heroes Wiki.

The problem isn't always readily apparent - especially whenever the bottom bar is open. It seems that whenever FireFox is rendering the bottom bar, the problem is limited to that bar, and disappears from the article I'm reading. However, now that we can close the bottom bar, it's not only easier to see the problem but also easier to compare an badly-rendered article with a "normal" one (by toggling the bar on and off).

Here is one example:

Click to enlarge...

Note the difference between the bold fonts in these pictures - on the left side they look just fine. On the right side, they look thinner, harder to make out, and the bold-italics font is virtually indistinguishable from the non-bold text.

Strangely, I find that this problem is much worse on my work computer, where all text - bold or otherwise - looks very ugly, is almost a splotchy light-green color instead of grey, and is extremely harsh to read (I'll provide an image of that if requested). That's probably a result of the different graphics card or display driver in that computer, which for some reason fails to interpret messed-up text in a different way - and anti-aliases it very badly as a result. In either case, both IE and Chrome show the text just fine -- as does FireFox while the bottom bar is open -- so it's clearly not a card or driver issue but a bug in FireFox.

If you've got FireFox, you can visit the page in the picture above to try it yourself (or any other wiki with dark background...), just toggle the bottom bar on and off using the button in the bottom right corner of your browser window, and look for differences in the page.

If you do encounter this, please pipe up. If you know how to solve this, PLEASE pipe up. Also note that add-ons make no difference, I've tried this with a clean FireFox install and all that. Also I've changed many settings in about:config, they don't seem to do anything.

Here's my general set-up for the two computers I use, both of which are experiencing this issue:

Since the problem is restricted to the bottom bar while it's open, it's not urgent or anything, but is very annoying. I hope someone has some idea.

Thanks in advance, -- Headrock (Talk) 23:47, October 3, 2012 (UTC)


 * Here's what I get in Firefox 15.0.1, compared to your two examples:
 * BugReport_2alt.png
 * I would argue that Firefox's text is even clearer than your other example, with the bottom bar having no effect. It's odd that the toolbar is involved in this - it might be limited to you only. Are you running the newest version of Firefox? If it's bogged down with addons or whatever else, you might try a fresh installation as well. If nothing else works, you can try sending a Special:Contact/bug report.


 * Huh, that's weird. I am running firefox 15.0.1 which is the latest AFAIK - and have encountered this problem for many months now anyway (and upgraded many times in the meanwhile with no change). And yes, as noted above I've run without addons AND tried a fresh install - with no change. I'm very surprised it works for you, and now I'm even more puzzled. --Headrock (Talk) 00:31, October 4, 2012 (UTC)


 * P.S. are you using Win7? Because I think the problem may be related to winXP only - I've run some tests and it appears that the system's font-smoothing behavior may be conflicting with FireFox in some way. I haven't confirmed this though. --Headrock (Talk) 01:00, October 4, 2012 (UTC)

I've uploaded a shot of the same thing happening on my work computer:

Click to enlarge...

On this computer, the windows font-smoothing is set to "cleartype" by default, whereas on my other computer (see screenshot above) it's set to "standard", with obviously-different results. The only setting that doesn't cause the problem to happen is if the windows font-smoothing is completely disabled - but then everything looks uglier, in all browsers, for obvious reasons. --Headrock (Talk) 18:03, October 4, 2012 (UTC)