No Orphans in Titles

Have you ever seen that thing in titles where one word goes to the next
line?

It can be really
annoying.

We love good typography here at
WordPress.com.

Well we’ve adapted a version of the Widon’t from Shaun Inman and turned it on for the whole site, so now those of you, especially those with fixed width themes, never have to worry about “that thing” happening again.

WordPress.com – worrying about silly stuff like orphans in titles so you don’t have to.


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91 Comments

Comments are closed.

  1. Darmok

    I love good typography too, so thank you!

    Like

  2. timethief

    Yes, orphan words in titles are annoying. Thanks a lot for adapting Widon’t from Shaun Inman this feature. 🙂

    Like

  3. cait

    this made me laugh…it’s that last line. and the creepy, creepy picture of oliver(?).

    thanks for looking out for those orphans for us. 🙂

    Like

  4. cmerry

    Yay thank you I am really bad about that sometimes I go on and on… 😛

    Like

  5. Uncle Su

    I don’t understand what this is actually doing…

    Like

  6. Nicole

    Nice! Thanks 🙂

    Like

  7. raincoaster

    Typographers and graphic designers all over the world thank you.

    Like

  8. Smaran

    I think I’ll have to experience this first-hand to understand how exactly it works. Does it look for phrases?

    Like

  9. Wengistein

    Harhar poor orphans. 😛 Though that was pretty annoying. Thanks for fixing it up. 🙂

    Like

  10. Daijinryuu

    Sweet.

    Like

  11. storymode

    I’m all about good style and typography myself. Nice addon! Thanks! ^^

    Like

  12. yuE

    and now we can truly be perfectionists!

    Like

  13. girlfriday

    Thanks. I like that you *fix* stuff so we don’t have to worry 🙂 ‘Specially at Christmas 😉

    Like

  14. mustafau

    Anyone who couldn’t recognize the difference may have a look at their blog at Google’s cache.

    Like

  15. بهمن

    So good 😉
    I & Sorush see this problem with Thirteen theme when we RTL this them.

    Thanks.

    Like

  16. livingjourney

    Ha…. thanks for that… by the way, love the photo of the orphan. More Please!

    V

    Like

  17. disembedded

    Hi Matt,

    This is good. I like your attention to very helpful detail. Best holiday wishes to you1

    Like

  18. Xomps

    That’s very cool ^^
    Thanx ^^

    Merry X-Mas to Everyone…

    Like

  19. madelynewyear

    FIRST COMMENT! I think… anyway… thats perfect….I hate that. It’s annoying. 😛

    Like

  20. Adi

    🙂 that’s great.

    Like

  21. zaid

    Way to go bro. It makes us look
    better.

    Like

  22. Khalil A.

    Haha, awesome. Was always wondering why this happens though.

    Like

  23. bollig

    hah, cool. thanks although i never would have known
    otherwise.

    Like

  24. fracas

    Well thank you! That makes me just about as happy as a kid who just found out he gets to open some presents on Christmas Eve!

    Merry Christmas to everyone at WordPress.

    Like

  25. Keith

    WordPress just keeps getting better because of the concerted and continual work and effort of its staff — great job guys and have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

    Like

  26. Galen

    I wanted to say that, too, (if it is the same thing) it is amazing how many things I did not realize I could avoid just by being here. That sounds ridiculous, but it is true. My orphans were not there, if they were, so now, they will never be! Wow! Blessings are like that, we might not even “see” them. THANK YOU AGAIN, MY FRIEND(S)!!! (is this the season to get from the givers, or what???) 😀
    –g

    Like

  27. Gilles Daigneault

    THX
    God I love this place!

    Like

  28. nikoxy

    I like WP because it is typo-wise!

    Like

  29. ish

    Nice feature.I’ve never had this happening actually but yeah,good typography is welcome anyday

    WordPress.com users-extremely happy with their administrators taking care of orphans in the titles so that we don’t have to.

    Like

  30. Rizwan

    Neat feature … though I dont have worries about my title !!! lolz..

    Like

  31. rumours

    Happy Holidays WP
    🙂

    Like

  32. Nicola

    Great idea – thank you

    Like

  33. Aishah

    WordPress.com – worrying about silly stuff like orphans in titles so you don’t have to.

    Lol, that’s jokes!

    Where di that come from again?

    Like

  34. H.Constantinos

    Very specific. Very good.

    Like

  35. adam

    brilliant, thank you!

    Like

  36. David W. Boles

    Excellent feature, Matt, thanks! It was always a challenge to write a headline that would break properly and then, if you changed templates, your headlines would break in really ugly ways anyway. This should solve that problem.

    Like

  37. Two Witches

    It’s so nice to know that all you programming types at WordPress are always looking to make improvements and to fix problems.

    Happy holidays
    Mama Kelly

    Like

  38. Shodan

    Yay. Happy festivus to all type lovers.

    Like

  39. The Nerd

    Please sir, can I have some more?

    Kidding 😉 But good work guys. Definatly above and beyond at this time of year 😉

    Merry Christmas.

    Like

  40. madelynewyear

    Ah lol.. I did have first comment.. but my comment had to be moderated for no reason XD Oh well. 😛

    Like

  41. Dave Bonta

    Bitchin’. Thanks.

    Like

  42. Michael

    Thanks, and Merry Christmas!

    Like

  43. Cubskick277 & Ompaloompa64

    that bothers me a lot too! thank god for

    wordpress

    Like

  44. businessgolf

    Thanks for watching out for us!

    Like

  45. jb

    Ok, apparently I woke up stupid today. I have no idea what Orphan Words are. Any help?

    Like

  46. Brian

    Matt,

    We are supposed to be using titles??? 😛

    Have a Merry Christmas and don’t work so hard. 🙂

    Like

  47. suburbanbanshee

    Nice bit of Christmas kaizen.

    Like

  48. Shirley

    …nor widows, either.

    Merry Christmas to all.

    Shirley Buxton
    http://www.writenow.wordpress.com

    Like

  49. Shirley

    Excuse me…or widows, either 😦

    Shirley

    Like

  50. David W. Boles

    I just noticed this works in the Sidebar, too, for the “Recent Posts” widget — very cool — but it doesn’t work on the “Top Posts” or “Recent Comments” widgets.

    Like

  51. torchwolf

    Mmm…. this seems to have prevented the:

    “My Title Had One Word
    Hanging”

    syndrome.

    But now, in the sidebar, what I often get instead, which looks even sillier is:

    “My Title Had
    One
    Word Hanging.”

    Hate to be a party-pooper, but if we can disable this in sidebars, so much the better!

    Like

  52. Nita

    Thanks. Titles of my posts are often long and this is just perfect.

    Like

  53. archiearchive

    Oh goody – now I can have r e a l l y l o n g titles. I like that.
    Thanks, Matt.

    Like

  54. Mr Patient

    Matt, could we also have better typography for alternate languages? For example, in French, the “:;!?»” signs must be preceeded by a non-breakable space, and “«” must be followed by a non-breakable space.

    Having WP do that automatically when French is the selected language would be a killer.

    Like

  55. Phil

    Thank You! This is a neat addition, a bit like a Christmas gift someone gives you before you realize there was a solution to one of life’s little annoyances 😀

    You really do look out for us, WordPress – A Merry christmas to you all~!

    Phil —

    Like

  56. Tina

    Wow, you guys thought of that?

    But it really is annoying when it goes to the next line.

    This just made me realize that I’m into good typography too.

    Like

  57. tobeme

    Nice holiday gift for us!

    Like

  58. Robert

    Thank you for fixing such an annoying problem!

    Like

  59. Coconuts

    This will undoubtedly improve the general quality of life for all wordpress.com users/readers, and for that I thank you.

    Like

  60. doublecheese

    Cool but man it seemed weir when on my dashboard I saw the title as “No orphans in titles”. I thought, “Does this mean we can’t have blog titles with “orphan” in them?”

    Like

  61. metaphorical

    Very cool. Surely hung punctuation is next?

    Like

  62. Admin

    Very nice, this should be applied to sidebar as well.

    Like

  63. deveels

    It’s just amazing how you pay attention even to the smallest things. Thanks.

    Like

  64. aikidude

    i had no idea what you were talking about (not being a journalist or… english mother tongue!!)

    good learning new things every day.. thanks wordpress!

    Like

  65. Pingback: My Seventh Life
  66. S. Weasel

    But what does it do instead? Shrink the font? Bounce another word to the second line to keep the orphan company?

    I just scrolled through my everything without finding a headline that long.

    Like

  67. gspence1173

    thanks!

    Like

  68. CottonWood

    Widon’t is really useful. thanks a lot

    Like

  69. blaze

    I don’t know what you’re

    talking about.

    Like

  70. hools

    Now where is the option to smack people for poor grammar? Will that be built in? Hope so! 😉
    On an unrelated note (honest!):

    You meant “fixed width” right?

    Like

  71. lostalien

    Thank you! In the spirit of Christmas and the Season, we try to look after all orphans… 🙂

    Like

  72. maique

    thanks.

    Like

  73. Free Willy

    Good! 😀 Thanks!

    Like

  74. phoenixashes88

    Oh, I hate it when that happens! Thank you!

    Like

  75. lisawarninger

    Wow, I love wordpress. Thanks guys.

    Like

  76. hillary

    much appreciated..

    Like

  77. Jacqui

    Aw. Those poor orphans. *grieves*

    Like

  78. bkbloodaxe

    Makes me want to get up there and leave some real untidy text hanging around. But, if it makes your holiday season more of a relaxing one …

    Like

  79. JLB

    Hooray! Thank you WordPress, and Happy Holidays!!!

    Like

  80. Milla

    U R a star! Thnks!

    Like

  81. Layla Gonzalez

    LOL! Thanks for worrying about orphans so we don’t have to. I appreciate it! 🙂

    Like

  82. Aristocrat

    Nice!! I don’t think I realized that this problem ever occurred to me before since I tend to use one-word headlines but props for the nice thought!

    Like

  83. Helton

    thank you I am really bad about that sometimes I go on . . .

    Like

  84. galvanized

    Bahaha thanks for making that piece of webpage/word processing information interesting. (Love the pic!)

    Like

  85. Meredith

    Thanks for solving the troublesome orphans and widows.
    Can Widon’t be applied to body copy and paragraph text too?

    Like

  86. arationalaversion

    Question: How do I get this little widget? Neither the comments above (on scanning, not reading) nor the brief article say how to get the Word version of this other guy’s product…or am I just being, like, illiterate?

    Like

  87. Matt

    arationalaversion, it’s already on your WP.com blog, it’s all automatic.

    Like

  88. BairbS

    That’s
    great,
    Matt.
    Thanks!

    Like

  89. Dmitri Marine

    hah neat. good typography, yay. i actually hadn’t even realised, just reading about this b/c of the december summary post.

    Like

  90. candyslice

    But what about the ORPHANS! Um, sorry. Thanks.

    Like

  91. symbologie

    Clean typography = love.

    I’m happy here already! *waves newbie flag*

    Like

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