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TUAW Tip: Say goodbye to Marker Felt notes

by Brett Terpstra Aug 5th 2008 at 2:15PM

Many iPhone users have expressed negative feelings toward the default Marker Felt font used in the Notes application. Personally, I dislike it enough that I used a manual hack on my previously jailbroken phone to get some Helvetica relief, but since I haven't felt the need to jailbreak since the 2.0 upgrade, I've been living with Marker Felt for now. We got a tip today, though, that offers a quasi-solution for those willing to deal with a little extra hassle.

A quick Google search reveals that we're not the first to discover this, but we thought it was worth sharing. If you're interested in trying it, go into the International keyboard settings in the General section of your iPhone or iPod touch Settings and select any of the Chinese keyboards in addition to your current keyboard.

Now, go into an existing note or create a new one in the Notes application. Switch the keyboard to the Chinese keyboard using the globe icon to the left of the spacebar and enter a single character. Backspace it and switch back to your native keyboard. Presto, the note should be free of Marker Felt. Saving the note will reveal that the title in the list has also undergone the same font change, and future edits will maintain it.

Adding new notes will require this little tweak every time, so it's not an all-around solution to the lack of font selection in Notes. If you're really, truly bothered by Marker Felt, however, it's a step in the right direction.

Thanks David!

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Many iPhone users have expressed negative feelings toward the default Marker Felt font used in the Notes application. Personally, I dislike...
 

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Ondra Soukup

now - imagine how much time you waste by doing that...isn't it really better to jailbreak and modify it forever ?

notes are supposed to be quick way to jot down little piece of text. this chinese hack ruins the purpose. if I'd be so anal about the fonts, I'd jailbreak

luckily, I don't care :)

August 11 2008 at 2:10 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
belwell

To use some well known SMS speak...OMFG!!!! I have never understood why Apple chose to make the Marker Font the font of choice for this app. It is impossible to read. Especially because of its compact-ness. Yes it would be nice to be able to sync these messages, but to be able to first read them is a step in the "write" direction! (sorry, I couldn't resist)

August 08 2008 at 1:47 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Rowan

Notes.app is a poignant reminder of the passing of the Newton. Marker Felt and the animated trash can are heartwarming reminders of the friendly green PDA who knew the writing was on the wall, despite promising so much.

R.I.P. Newton.



August 06 2008 at 7:21 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Klaus

Ohhh, so that's the point of having multiple keyboards enabled, you can switch between them with the globe. That's excellent, I was kinda annoyed that my english mails would be corrected all the time because I use danish keyboard, but now I can just switch on the globe whenever I need to write in a different language. Thanks for the tip :)

August 06 2008 at 5:51 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Stupod

This also works with the Japanese keyboard so probably works with most keyboards that use a different alphabet.

August 06 2008 at 3:19 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
gtdavemac

I don't mind Marker Felt at all. Whatever font that is which you have shown on the article picture looks horrible!

August 05 2008 at 10:13 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to gtdavemac's comment
Alex Reid

That'd be Helvetica, the font used for all other text in the iPhone's UI. Which is, as we all know, an aesthetic *disaster*.

August 06 2008 at 1:02 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Ondra Soukup

well, on the note, it looks horrible ;)

August 11 2008 at 2:11 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Jimmy E

Hey! I did that by accident, but I couldn't figure out what I did. It happened when I was showing off the language support to my sister's boyfriend so I guess that's what it was. Sweet

August 05 2008 at 4:59 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Galley

What's with the universal hatred for Marker Felt? I, for one, like it.

August 05 2008 at 4:22 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Jeremy Villaroman

I'm not sure if I hate Marker Felt enough, but it's good to know that should I develop a disdain for it, I can do something about it.

August 05 2008 at 4:00 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Patrick Maley

this is a weak hint. aren't there bigger productivity gains out there?

August 05 2008 at 3:50 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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