Question

For some reason, Firefox and Chrome render line-height differently when using text-shadow.

CSS:

#tracker {
    width:200px;
    color:#999;
    font:normal 12px Verdana,sans-serif;/* Swapped out Arial with Verdana */
}

#tracker ol {
    float: right;
    margin: 0;
    padding: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    list-style: none;
}

#tracker li {
    float: left;
    margin: 0 0 0 6px;
    padding: 0;
    height: 13px;
    width: 13px;
    color: #666;
    background-color: #ccc;
    border: 1px solid #c0c0c0;
    border-radius: 9px;
    -moz-border-radius: 9px;
    -webkit-border-radius: 9px;
    text-align: center;
    line-height: 13px;
    font-size: 9px;
    text-shadow: 1px 1px 1px #fff;
    overflow: hidden;
}

#tracker li.current {
    color: #fff;
    text-shadow: -1px -1px 1px #033e69;
    font-weight: bold;
    background-color: #13699e;
    border: 1px solid #369;
}
#tracker li span{display:none;}
#step1:before{content:"1"}
#step2:before{content:"2"}
#step3:before{content:"3"}
#step4:before{content:"4"}​

HTML:

<div id="tracker">
    <span class="steps">Steps <span id="current-step">1</span> of 4</span>
    <ol>
        <li id="step1" class="current"><span>Sender</span></li>
        <li id="step2" class="future"><span>Recipient</span></li>
        <li id="step3" class="future"><span>Delivery info</span></li>
        <li id="step4" class="future"><span>Line items</span></li>
    </ol>
</div>

When the text-shadow is below the text (positive numbers) it presses the text up.

Shouldn’t the text be the same no matter where the shadow is rendered? (as shown in FF and IE?)

The only work-around I have found is to increase the line-height (from 13px to 15px) when shadow is below (using positive numbers), but then it screws it up for non-webkit browsers (Firefox and IE).

Demo of the problem… Any ideas?

UPDATE:
I figured it out and have updated my code. It was a font issue. I was using Arial but when I changed it to Verdana the problem was solved. Very strange!

The solution! 🙂

Answer 1

This appears to be an issue with Arial and Helvetica fonts when rendered at sizes below 10px. Changing the font to Verdana fixes the problem.

The only part of the code I had to change was the following declaration in the CSS:

#tracker { 
    /* from this...
    font:normal 12px Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;*/ 
    /* to this...*/
    font: normal 12px Verdana, sans-serif;
}

The solution! 🙂

Alternatively,
It also works if you use larger font-sizes for Arial or Helvetica, as demonstrated here.
(But then you need to increase the height & width of the step-circles from 13px to 14px.)

Here’s the CSS for the larger font version, using Arial or Helvetica:

#tracker { 
    /* this has changed */
    font: normal 14px Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
    /* the rest is the same as before */
    width: 200px;
    color: #999;
}

#tracker ol {
    float: right;
    margin: 0;
    padding: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    list-style: none;
}

#tracker li { 
    /* these were changed */
    height: 14px;
    width: 14px;
    font-size: 11px;
    /* the rest is the same as before */
    float: left;
    margin: 0 0 0 6px;
    padding: 0;
    border: 1px solid #c0c0c0;
    border-radius: 9px;
    -moz-border-radius: 9px;
    -webkit-border-radius: 9px;
    text-align: center;
    line-height: 1.45em;
    color: #666;
    background-color: #ccc;
    text-shadow: 1px 1px 1px #fff;
    overflow: hidden;
}

#tracker li.current {
    color: #fff;
    text-shadow: -1px -1px 1px #033e69;
    font-weight: bold;
    background-color: #13699e;
    border: 1px solid #369;
}

#tracker li span {
    display: none;
}

#step1:before {
    content: "1"
}

#step2:before {
    content: "2"
}

#step3:before {
    content: "3"
}

#step4:before {
    content: "4"
}
​