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An official website of the United States government

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An official website of the United States government

Here's how you know

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Design system switcher

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Design system switcher

Theme:

Design system switcher

Version:

Design system switcher

Measure

Line length, also called "measure", is an important part of readability.

Format: .ds-u-measure--[narrow|base|wide]

.ds-u-measure--narrow (line length ~45 characters)
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
.ds-u-measure--base (line length ~65 characters)
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
.ds-u-measure--wide (line length ~80 characters)
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Guidance

Accessibility

A line of text shouldn’t be longer than 80 characters. This helps users with certain reading or visual disabilities that have trouble keeping their place when reading long lines of text. If the width of the text container is resized, it should be allowed to scale in a way so 80 characters or less are shown...Another way to ensure good line-length is to use a fluid layout or apply responsive web design techniques that allow the user to resize the window to find a comfortable line length. — W3C

Style customization

The following CSS variables can be overridden to theme the measure utility:

  • --measure-narrow
  • --measure-base
  • --measure-wide