Q: Yosemite font size is too small for vision impaired

Spuddle, quite a few of us are having issues. Apple must think we all have Bionic vision or something, unfortunately its design over function and legibility.

Firstly go to System Preferences > Accessibility > Reduce Transparency  - and tick the box.

You could also increase contrast here too. You may need to reboot for settings to take effect.

Now for increased Messages Text Size:

Messages > Preferences > Text Size > select Other > Fonts window will open > select Font Size (on right)

For other system fixes and even a revert to Mavericks fonts there are threads on other Mac forums which go into detail on that, Google is your friend.

Good luck.

Hmmm....   I see a sliding bar for font size, but where is "select Other" hiding? 

After you tick Reduce Tranparency, Log Out or restart your Mac and then the "Other" will pop up in Messages > Preferences > Text Size

Its a Yosemite Bug we believe, you can read all about it here:

Message font too small in Yosemite

I forgot to add - The best idea is to tick "Increase Contrast" as well and then logout or restart and when you look again the reduce Transparency box will be greyed out.

I also highly recommend an Extension for Safari called Zoombysite to remember the zoom levels of websites, a discussion of that is here:

Re: How to keep the Zoom level in Safari 7?

Apple is forgetting is core competence..

USABILITY.

With so many of the baby boomers living longer, the typical age distribution graphs the past which looked like pyramids now look like rectangles.

What it means is that more people as a percentage are over 45 years old. And now tend to be shortsighted.

I have been lasered twice once or laser PRK and once for Lasik  I now have arguably the best vision I've ever had better than 20/20 I now have 20/5 vision.

But this comes at cost–I have more trouble reading normal text like magazines in lowlight or florescent light, the contrast has gone down as well, and my the ability to thread a needle is pretty much gone.

So there really isn't much of the technology fix for me or the rest of the baby boomers. And what good are high contrast high-definition screens if you can't read them. They become of less value than a lower definition screen zoomed.

For the iphones, iOS 7 was a complete disaster compared to IOS 6 because it made the phone is impossible to read. My solution was to buy the new iPhone 6 plus and use zoom mode all the time so the display of the normal iPhone six would be blown up all the time zoom scaled so I would seen the exact display layout of the iPhone 6 only bigger on the iPhone 6 Plus. I didn't want more information per screen , I just wanted the ability to read quickly without strain.

It's a MEGA unforgivable  oversight for them not to offer something like this on their computers. Just like the iPad mini, And iPad are respectively permanently " zoom scaled" relative to one another displaying exactly the same info as their aspect ratios are identical (I can't use the iPad Mini , find myself zoom scrolling with the regular iPad for some websites and need a iPad pro  that is a zoom scaled iPad (an no... reading glasses are not the answer) , READER helps.... but it isn't working for everything, and through READER is a nice experience for some sites it is not working well for all sites. Besides- sometimes you need to read and watch other things at the same time and only have 1 screen.

The phones are respectively zoom scaled relative to another, we should have that same option ......say you have a 15 inch MacBook Pro you should be able to zoom scale it as if it were a 13 inch MacBook Pro or even an 11 inch MacBook air.

IOS 8 and Yosemite are trying to go a long way towards integration with continuity, and part of it should be that each device should be equally easy to read. Currently the reader function on the iPhone 6 plus can be easier to read than a regular iPad without READER.

I used to say that Apple was a thinly disguised software company pretending to be a hardware company, and then I said Apple is a usability company pretending to be a software company  that  is pretending to be a hardware company.  If you take away the usability art- apple becomes just another seller of slick Industrial designed PC's.

Apple has always been about the user interface. Tim Cook  is clearly losing his way and losing his competitive edge over the rest of the personal computing platforms by sacrificing usability and the user interface. Amy try to imitate Steve Jobs stage walk and pauses in speech onstage, but what he really should be imitating is Steve Jobs fanatical devotion to usability.

Please don't let the Apple rot.

Golden Ears: You CAN implement a zoom scaling on your Mac computer, it's always been available and is nothing new. Simply open System Preferences >  Displays. Set the resolution to "Scaled" and pick one of the resolutions listed in the box below. I run my monitor at 1600x1000 instead of its native 1920x1200 and it makes a difference. Here's how mine looks:

You can change them on the fly too, no need to reboot or anything.

I use this along with zoom-scrolling and both are useful tools.

I have a 27" iMac, until Yosemite I never had to use the zooming lens, now I have to use it all the time because I can't read the ridiculously small system font. And the worst of all: Apple forces you to use it as it is, you can't increase the size or change font altogether. Yosemite has many nice new features I do like, but this is the worst Apple "update" ever. Helvetica Neue may look nice on a Retina display - if you are working on a 27" screen it's a nightmare. Less is more? Sometimes less is just less. - And the new "transparency look" is just a completely useless gimmick.

I'm working on a Mac since 1988 when I bought my first Mac SE, and every OS since was a big step forward. Until Yosemite came. Steve Jobs credo: 'Form follows function' made Apple great. That seems to be over.

will apple start selling glasses ?

i cannot stay more than 10 minutes in front of the new yosemite screen

the font is not proper and the characters are too small

the folder color has an intollerable contast

i will need to change computer.

please go back to the previous one

please

I have the same problem like most of the people under this subject and your points are more comprehensive. I agree with you.

Apple restore the font functions immediately.

I used to trust Apple and have been following the upgrades as soon as they are available. From now on, I will wait and see other users experience than decide whether it is justified for an upgrade or not.

Thats why its called H e ll-vetica... (Apple censored the word h e l l ? *** whatszup with the puritan BS ?)

Hard to imagine why Apple thought one font size fits all with Yosemite Safari.  Like stairs as the only option to enter a building.  You would think that developers have a required set of basic functions for all new designs.  Definitely and Apple ****.

Maybe this is a violation of the Americans with Disability Act?

I'm not trying to be funny.

This is a very serious problem for many of us Mac users.

If the screen wasn't going to be easily legible on non-Retina Macs, why were we not advised not to download and install Yosemite?

A very salient point!

I'm still running Snow Leopard on my 2010 iMac, but in preparation for installing Yosemite I upgraded my memory to 16Gb. I think I'm going to hang off.

It's clearly NOT just vision impaired people (like myself) who have been impacted by this either.

You have me wondering what International Standards recommend as well?