Examples of fonts are often given as “The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog” or “The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dogs back” or “The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog”. I have heard it said that this uses each letter of the alphabet once although the same letter is used more than once. What does this sentence mean and why is it used as an example of fonts?
Exactly as you said: it is used as it is one of the shortest meaningful sentences that utilises all 26 letters, thus showing all of the characters in the chosen font.
Oh, as an aside, see here for other examples of pangrams, such as:
None quite so elegant as the original you mentioned.
‘jumps’, not ‘jumped’. Otherwise there’s no ‘S’.
If you ever took (and passed) a touch-typing class, that sentence should be seared into your memory :). And if you took it at a Catholic High School, it should be burned into your knuckles as well
(tappity,tappity,tappity, WHACK!…“Eyes on the page, not the keyboard…don’t let me catch you looking at it again, Son” - no, I’m not kidding - that’s why I can touch-type at 115+ wpm on a computer/electric typewriter, and 75-80 wpm on a manual typewriter :eek: )
Again, because it has every letter of the alphabet in it, and because it consists almost entirely of “see spot run”-type words, it has become standard to learn how to type that sentence during typing drills.
critter42
My favorite panagram is “Mr Jock, TV quiz PHD, bags few lynx.” It’s actually understandable.
My fave:
Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs. (32 chars.)
Even the alphabet knew!! 
Okay, slight hijack here. Can someone tell me what the significance of the following sentence is, which is also used in typing classes?
Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.
I don’t see any patterns in this sentence where it would be an especially useful typing exercise.
If you type it out, you might notice that when typing it, all three keyboard rows are hit equally but the distribution is fairly random making it a challenge to type.
I had some trouble finding this one in the archives. Cecil Adams on Who originated, “Now is the time for all good men …”
My favorite is The five boxing wizards jump quickly. I think mostly because I picture the event in my head. 