Unwanted "smart" replacement of the letter x with a multiplication sign

[captainmeta4]

Describe the bug
Typing a lowercase x between two numbers causes the letter x to be "smart" replaced with a multiplication sign.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Type a numerical character
2. type an x
3. type another numerical character

Expected behavior
The letter x should remain as an x. The font should not trying to assume the user's intention and replacing characters with glyphs that belong to other characters. By doing this, the Inter font fails to accurately render string data.

Screenshots
A user signed up to our web site with the username "x0x7_". It was displayed like this (our usernames are prefixed with the "@" character, similar to twitter)

Removing Inter font from our site fixed this problem, and allowed the user's name to be correctly displayed.

Environment

• OSX, iOS

[Euguar]

Hi, @captainmeta4!

I guess it’s not a bug. You may to use CSS font-feature-settings property to disable liga option for element.
E.g.: p { font-feature-settings: "liga" 0; } — that’s line in CSS will allow you to disable transform from x (symbol) to × (multiply sign).

Good luck!

[be5invis]

Should we use liga for "smart placements"? I think it should be calt, or even case.

[rsms]

It should be part of calt as @be5invis points out and not liga, but it is. My bad.

inter/src/features/liga.fea

Lines 69 to 78 in d8d4e0c

	# x surrounded by numbers, e.g. 3x4 -> 3×4
	sub @Numeral x' @Numeral by multiply; # 3x9
	sub @Numeral @Whitespace x' @Numeral by multiply; # 3 x9
	sub @Numeral @Whitespace @Whitespace x' @Numeral by multiply; # 3 x9
	sub @Numeral x' @Whitespace @Numeral by multiply; # 3x 9
	sub @Numeral @Whitespace x' @Whitespace @Numeral by multiply; # 3 x 9
	sub @Numeral @Whitespace @Whitespace x' @Whitespace @Numeral by multiply; # 3 x 9
	sub @Numeral x' @Whitespace @Whitespace @Numeral by multiply; # 3x 9
	sub @Numeral @Whitespace x' @Whitespace @Whitespace @Numeral by multiply; # 3 x 9
	sub @Numeral @Whitespace @Whitespace x' @Whitespace @Whitespace @Numeral by multiply; # 3 x 9

I’ll move it to calt for the next release. Once that’s out, you can disable calt like this:

body {
  font-variant-ligatures: no-contextual;
}

Should work in a modern web browser. (https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/font-variant-ligatures) You can use font-feature-settings too, but keep in mind that it resets all font features so you have to explicitly include all features you still want to keep enabled, like for instance liga or any cvXX or ssXX you may use.