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837

answers:

2

I need a font that shows letters and function keys on a keyboard, so that I can show Ctrl+Alt+S as 3 separate keys on a keyboard, not as the text.

I've looked at two, and one of them had lots of missing keys (among other things, the Win key), the other one cost over $100.

Any good ideas?

Oh, and this needs to be a truetype font, for Windows, and usable in .NET (so apparently no pure bitmap fonts)


Edit: "Free" in the above sense means that I can freely distribute the font file with my program. When I typed the question in I was hoping for a free download as well, but I'll settle for cheap, as I can always use the font for documentation in other projects. So if anyone knows some non-free, non-royalty-based, complete, keyboard fonts, that are cheap, I'll settle for that as well.

+3  A: 

This looks like it meets your requirements: http://www.webpagepublicity.com/free-fonts/k/Keycaps%20Regular.ttf

I prefer sites that have fonts displayed in the page so I can see them directly since I don't know the name of virtually any fonts. To that point, this site does just as I like http://www.webpagepublicity.com


EDIT: Before using this link please read the comments. It was pointed out that this font is not free and that this site has a number of fonts for download which are not to be redistributed.

Anthony Potts
Here's a link to the page on that site which actually shows the example of the font in question: http://www.webpagepublicity.com/free-fonts-k.html#FreeFonts
Adam Bellaire
http://www.webpagepublicity.com/free-fonts/k/Free-Fonts-K023.gif
Pokus
Uhm, when I open this font, it says "From the WSI-FONT Collection. Copyright (c) 1992 W.S.I. All Rights Reserved. Redistribution strictly prohibited." I definitely don't see anything "free" in this font, free-as-beer nor free-as-speech.
Piskvor
@piskvor forgive my ignorance, but what exactly did you open that with to see that information?
Anthony Potts
@Antony: On Windows at least, a number of utilities provide the info. Most primitive is a simple hex viewer (or even a text editor not chocking on binary). Arjan Mel's Font Viewer shows that clearly. So is Microsoft TrueType Extension (in properties of file). Etc.
PhiLho
Good catch, looks nice but can't really use it.
Lasse V. Karlsen
A quick download of 10 fonts showed me 7 had copyright, 1 had a freeware message and 2 didn't say. I don't think I would trust this "free" site.
Lasse V. Karlsen
Yeah, looks bad now. Not sure what to do with this answer...maybe I ought to just delete it since that site now seems very fishy.
Anthony Potts
@Anthony: leave the answer, and point to the comments, all infos here are of interest... :-)
PhiLho
A: 

For Windows keys (including the Windows flag and right-click menu keys), get Betsy Flanagan and Betsy Flanagan Two, both from larabiefonts, free for website use.

For Mac keys (including the Clover, Cmd, Opt, lights, and numeric keypad keys), use MacKeyCaps, but it does have copyright. Several web sites have it for download, haven't found the actual source to check for licensing.

I have a page displaying the keycap fonts I've tried, with mappings and CSS to download and display the characters so the text on the keys is about the same size as text on your web page, at http://www.lernerconsult.com/keycaps.php

I have how to use downloadable TrueType/OpenType fonts, with automatic font substitution through CSS if your user's browser doesn't support downloadable fonts, and how to have fonts look the same size even if the letters like x, a, c are different heights at the same point size, at my font-size-adjust page, linked from the keycaps page.

George Lerner
Betsy Flanagen (either) are not possible to use in .NET, I guess they're bitmap-fonts.
Lasse V. Karlsen