Bad take imo. Footnotes are great when you want to add an aside that will enhance the reading experience for interested readers, but is not crucial information. Not all readers are equally...
Bad take imo. Footnotes are great when you want to add an aside that will enhance the reading experience for interested readers, but is not crucial information. Not all readers are equally interested in the same material, and footnotes are a great tool to make your content relevant for multiple audiences.
Also 80% of their argument is that they dislike footnotes that are poorly implemented. Well, yeah. So do I. Luckily my footnotes link to the specific footnote's line when you jump down, and back to the previous line when you jump back up. So do most blogs' footnotes. There's tons of sample JS that you can import if setting up your own blog.
You're right that having footnote indicators link to the actual footnote and having links back to where you were is the right way to do it, and it's nice to hear that you've implemented them well...
You're right that having footnote indicators link to the actual footnote and having links back to where you were is the right way to do it, and it's nice to hear that you've implemented them well on your blog. Unfortunately there are more websites on the internet, and not all of them are so considerate.
When visiting an unfamiliar website, there's no way to tell whether they've set up links back to the content, and you don't find out until you click one of the footnotes. This is in part because I don't know whether I just clicked an actual hyperlink (therefore adding an entry into my browser's history stack) or a button that's disguised as a link. If I hit the back button in my browser, am I actually going to go back to where I was or will I end up on the previous page? I do a lot of reading on my phone, where the perceived cost of navigation is higher. It makes me afraid to click a footnote indicator because I don't know whether I'll be able to find my way back easily.
If you have to have footnotes, I'm much more of a fan of a hybrid approach. Have your footnotes, but also have a way of bringing them inline. As the author mentioned, popovers are a thing you can do on the web that you can't with physical paper (though they have their own problems too). Some form of popover is also better on mobile, where the smaller screen width leads to much taller pages.
All this doesn't stop it from being a subpar reading experience. Footnotes break the flow of reading, and if you do follow them then you're taken to a space containing disparate ideas that do not relate to each other and have to find your way back. You, as a reader, get removed from the very context that you're trying to expand upon. My ideal solution to footnotes is to just... not have footnotes. If you're referring to something else, use a hyperlink. I can click it for more information. If you have an anecdote or opinion, put it in parentheses. If the anecdote is too long to fit in parentheses, put it in a collapsible section. If your opinion is too long, then congratulations you've got something to say and that should be its own paragraph. The writing does lose some of its personality in the process, but to me the sacrifice is worth it for the readability. It also forces you to think about how your are writing more, which I think helps with improving at writing itself.
One of the most distinctive features of Tufte’s style is his extensive use of sidenotes. Sidenotes are like footnotes, except they don’t force the reader to jump their eye to the bottom of the page, but instead display off to the side in the margin. Perhaps you have noticed their use in this document already. You are very astute.
Sidenotes are a great example of the web not being like print. On sufficiently large viewports, Tufte CSS uses the margin for sidenotes, margin notes, and small figures. On smaller viewports, elements that would go in the margin are hidden until the user toggles them into view. The goal is to present related but not necessary information such as asides or citations as close as possible to the text that references them. At the same time, this secondary information should stay out of the way of the eye, not interfering with the progression of ideas in the main text.
Sidenotes consist of two elements: a superscript reference number that goes inline with the text, and a sidenote with content.
You beat me to it! Tufte's style is by far my favorite solution to this, though admittedly it works much better on big, wide screens than on mobile devices in portrait aspect.
You beat me to it! Tufte's style is by far my favorite solution to this, though admittedly it works much better on big, wide screens than on mobile devices in portrait aspect.
I love everything about that, except the horrible choice for a serif font on the web as the main body text font. I get it, it’s stylized, but reading it was a chore (especially on mobile).
I love everything about that, except the horrible choice for a serif font on the web as the main body text font. I get it, it’s stylized, but reading it was a chore (especially on mobile).
I like the implementation of sidenotes used in Crafting Interpreters. It puts them inline when rendered on narrower windows. Also, footnotes on Substack seem pretty decent.
I like the implementation of sidenotes used in Crafting Interpreters. It puts them inline when rendered on narrower windows.
Bad take imo. Footnotes are great when you want to add an aside that will enhance the reading experience for interested readers, but is not crucial information. Not all readers are equally interested in the same material, and footnotes are a great tool to make your content relevant for multiple audiences.
Also 80% of their argument is that they dislike footnotes that are poorly implemented. Well, yeah. So do I. Luckily my footnotes link to the specific footnote's line when you jump down, and back to the previous line when you jump back up. So do most blogs' footnotes. There's tons of sample JS that you can import if setting up your own blog.
You're right that having footnote indicators link to the actual footnote and having links back to where you were is the right way to do it, and it's nice to hear that you've implemented them well on your blog. Unfortunately there are more websites on the internet, and not all of them are so considerate.
When visiting an unfamiliar website, there's no way to tell whether they've set up links back to the content, and you don't find out until you click one of the footnotes. This is in part because I don't know whether I just clicked an actual hyperlink (therefore adding an entry into my browser's history stack) or a button that's disguised as a link. If I hit the back button in my browser, am I actually going to go back to where I was or will I end up on the previous page? I do a lot of reading on my phone, where the perceived cost of navigation is higher. It makes me afraid to click a footnote indicator because I don't know whether I'll be able to find my way back easily.
If you have to have footnotes, I'm much more of a fan of a hybrid approach. Have your footnotes, but also have a way of bringing them inline. As the author mentioned, popovers are a thing you can do on the web that you can't with physical paper (though they have their own problems too). Some form of popover is also better on mobile, where the smaller screen width leads to much taller pages.
All this doesn't stop it from being a subpar reading experience. Footnotes break the flow of reading, and if you do follow them then you're taken to a space containing disparate ideas that do not relate to each other and have to find your way back. You, as a reader, get removed from the very context that you're trying to expand upon. My ideal solution to footnotes is to just... not have footnotes. If you're referring to something else, use a hyperlink. I can click it for more information. If you have an anecdote or opinion, put it in parentheses. If the anecdote is too long to fit in parentheses, put it in a collapsible section. If your opinion is too long, then congratulations you've got something to say and that should be its own paragraph. The writing does lose some of its personality in the process, but to me the sacrifice is worth it for the readability. It also forces you to think about how your are writing more, which I think helps with improving at writing itself.
Tufte’s CSS with inline sidenotes on mobile and actual sidenotes if there’s enough width?
You beat me to it! Tufte's style is by far my favorite solution to this, though admittedly it works much better on big, wide screens than on mobile devices in portrait aspect.
I love everything about that, except the horrible choice for a serif font on the web as the main body text font. I get it, it’s stylized, but reading it was a chore (especially on mobile).
I like the implementation of sidenotes used in Crafting Interpreters. It puts them inline when rendered on narrower windows.
Also, footnotes on Substack seem pretty decent.