Help Desk.How It Works.Page Seven

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All About Fonts

Macintosh users - particularly publishing professionals - have a love/hate relationship with fonts. They LOVE that the Mac makes it so easy to install and use different fonts and typefaces - especially in comparison to what Wintel users have to go through. But, they HATE the fact that managing large font libraries can become a nightmare.

No matter how long this page might be, it could never fully explain the subject of font management. Entire books can - and have - been written on the subject. If you're a publishing professional, this page probably won't have the answers you're looking for. In the time and space allowed, we'll only be able to discuss the basics.

Why We Use Fonts: Fonts are the data files our computers use to display and print specific typefaces. Fonts add variety to our documents. They allow us to emphasize key phrases. And, they give documents "personality." Some fonts demand attention, and some seem to whisper. Some appear to be feminine, while others are more masculine. Some convey emotions, while others appear bland and boring. Some are easy to read in small sizes, while others can be read at great distances.

About Font Files, Styles and Families: Each font file contains the instructions your Mac needs to create the letter shapes for all characters, numerals and punctuation marks in a single typeface. And, each typeface may be available in several basic styles (Plain or Roman, Bold, Italic and Bold-Italic), with a separate font file to define each style.

In addition, there may be other fonts in the font "family." For example, beyond the four basic styles available for most fonts, a complete font family might include Light, Heavy, Thin, SemiBold, Condensed Italic, UltraBold Italic, and dozens of other styles. It is this variety of font styles and families that makes font management such a difficult task.

Finally, you need to understand that each font file must do two jobs equally well: Look clear and smooth on your monitor screen, AND print correctly to a wide variety of printers. To accomplish these two tasks, the industry has created and accepted two completely different types of fonts: TrueType and Postscript.

About TrueType Fonts: TrueType fonts are a joint creation of Apple and Microsoft, and were designed specifically for use in basic home and office environments. The advantage of TrueType fonts is that they do an acceptable job of looking good both on screen, and when printed to ink jet printers, no matter what size you define. They are able to accomplish both tasks by relying on QuickDraw technology which, in the simplest of terms, first creates your monitor screen image and then uses that image as a blueprint for "drawing" a printed page. In the Fonts Sampler window below, you can see that the font "Charcoal" has the icon of a TrueType font: A page marked with three small "A" characters.

About Postscript Fonts: Postscript fonts were created by the Adobe Corporation, specifically for use with laser printers that use Adobe's Postscript page description language. They create the sharpest printed image at any size, on any laser printer or professional output device. These are the fonts used by publishing professionals!

But, these printer-emphasized fonts aren't so great for onscreen display. So, Adobe's engineers decided to give each Postscript font two parts. One is called the "Outline" (Printer) font. In the window below, this component is identified by the large "A" in a red striped field. (NOTE: This is Adobe's printer font icon. The icon used for printer fonts will vary depending on the manufacturer. But, if you view your fonts as a "List" in a Finder window, printer fonts will ALWAYS show that they are "Postscript Fonts.") Postscript printer fonts contain the instructions your laser printer needs to draw the font on paper perfectly at any size.

The second part of a Postscript Font is the "bitmap" (screen) component. The screen font icon is always the same. As shown below, it looks like a page document with a single large "A." You will also notice that bitmap fonts contain a number in their name - in this case "Courier 12." That is the "point size" of the screen font, the exact letter size this particular font will draw correctly on your screen. Most Postscript font packages include several screen fonts to draw characters on screen at different sizes. The most common sizes are 10, 12, 14, 18, 24 and 36 points.

About Adobe Type Manager: You've probably identified the problem with Postscript fonts already: What if you select a type size like "16 points" that isn't available as an installed bitmap screen font? In most cases, the character will display on screen very poorly, with jagged edges and a strange shape. Adobe, however, was quick to develop a solution to this problem: Adobe Type Manager (ATM).

As you can tell from its icon (above) ATM is a Control Panel. Its job is to use the Postscript PRINTER file data as a blueprint for creating bitmap versions of each character that will look correct on screen.

ATM is no longer available as a stand-alone product because it's now a component of Adobe's ATM Deluxe software - which also provides powerful font management capabilities. The standard ATM Control Panel, however, is included with all Adobe products, including their Adobe Acrobat Reader software (used for viewing Portable Document Format ".pdf" files), which is available as a free download from the Adobe web site.

About Font Substitution: When you install ATM (or ATM Deluxe) two new Postscript fonts (bitmap font suitcases and outline printer fonts) will be installed in your system: Adobe Sans and Adobe Serif. These are "generic" fonts (similar to Helvetica and Times, respectively) that ATM uses to display and print documents which contain fonts you don't have installed.

Which Type of Fonts Should You Use:

HOME USERS: If you are a home user, with only an ink jet printer, you should probably use only TrueType fonts. You won't see any advantage from using Postscript professional fonts.

BUSINESS OFFICE: If you primarily use a Laser printer in a small office environment with simple text printing needs, you CAN use both Postscript and TrueType fonts. (NOTE: Another function of ATM is to improve the printed appearance of TrueType fonts on Postscript laser printers.) However, we recommend against mixing font types to avoid the possibility of installing both the TrueType and Postscript versions of the same font. This can cause "font conflicts" that make your system unstable. Most often we suggest using TrueType fonts with ATM installed.

PUBLISHING PROFESSIONALS: If you are a professional publisher who prints to Postscript laser printers, high-end color ink jets and high-resolution output devices (Linotronic), you should avoid TrueType fonts completely. (Keep only those four your computer needs to function: Chicago, Monaco, Geneva and Charcoal.) TrueType fonts are notorious for creating printing problems on high-end Postscript printing devices.

About Suitcases: Inside your Mac, fonts are stored in "suitcases," a specialized type of folder. Most often, font suitcases are located in the Fonts Folder inside your System Folder. A basic set of font suitcases is installed by the MacOS system software. Other applications, especially web browsers and games, may also install their own required fonts.

Both TrueType font files, and the Bitmap (screen) portion of Postscript font files should always be stored in Suitcases. You CAN include fonts from several different families in a single suitcase, but - for purposes of organization - it's best to limit each suitcase to only one font family. The Outline (printer) components of Postscript fonts should be placed in the same folder as the suitcases containing their corresponding outline font files, but NOT inside the suitcases themselves.

The Required Fonts: There are four TrueType Font Suitcases that ALWAYS need to be installed in the Fonts Folder inside your System Folder: Charcoal (Only in MacOS 8+), Geneva, Monaco and Chicago. These are the four fonts that your Mac uses to draw and display your desktop. In addition, four other fonts - in either the Postscript (suitcase full of bitmap font files AND outline printer files) or TrueType versions (but, never BOTH), should be in your system's Fonts Folder: Times, Courier, Helvetica and Symbol. These are critical files that set the standards for how your computer displays all other fonts.

Any other fonts can also be installed in the system's Fonts Folder. But, we strongly recommend that if you have more than 50 font suitcases installed, you should purchase a Font Management Utility.

Font Management Utilities: As we mentioned earlier, ATM Deluxe is the best on the market. Aside from making both printed and onscreen fonts look their best, this software also checks fonts for corruptions, identifies duplicate TrueType and Postscript Fonts, resolves some font conflicts, activates only those fonts you need (which reduces RAM requirements and increases system stability) and allows you to store all but the basic fonts listed above in a separate Fonts Folder anywhere on your hard drive. For overall stability, ATM Deluxe is a must-have utility for any professional computer user. (We've seen professional publishing systems contain more than 3,000 different font suitcases!)

Font Numbers and Names: Each font, either TrueType of Postscript, SHOULD have a unique name. You should NEVER change the names of your font files!!! (Changing suitcase names is allowed.) However, with the many thousands of fonts in the world, you may run across two fonts (or the same font from two different manufacturers) that share the same name. This WILL cause font conflicts, system errors and bombs. (NOTE: When an application looks for a font, it ALWAYS makes its request for a specific font NAME.)

Each individual font style also has a unique invisible code number. Again, there are now so many fonts that number conflicts are quite common. If you use a Font Management Utility like ATM Deluxe, it will attempt to assign one of the conflicting fonts a new ID number. This is OK if the fonts are ONLY used on one machine (Font numbers are part of the Mac's internal font management scheme.) But, in office environments, where fonts are often "shared" (check your licenses carefully) this can be a problem. For example, if YOUR machine has changed the ID number for one or two font styles, that's fine. But, if you then try to use those fonts on another machine - where their new font ID numbers are already in use - the Mac may have problems identifying and displaying that particular font style correctly.

Font Versions: As if the whole subject wasn't confusing enough, you also need to remember that manufacturers occasionally "upgrade" their fonts. This is often a problem when older documents use an older version of the font. If a new version is installed, older documents may have problems printing, (they usually generate a Postscript error) or text will rewrap due to variances in how the font is displayed on screen.

Solving Font Problems: For most Macintosh users, font problems are extremely rare. But for desktop publishing professionals with hundreds or thousands of fonts installed, problems may creep up quite often. Since it would be almost impossible to suggest methods to fix all of the font problems and conflicts you might encounter, perhaps the best advice is to follow these suggestions to help avoid conflicts before they arise.

USE fonts intelligently. Professional designers will tell you that most people use too many "trendy" fonts, which make their documents confusing, unattractive and hard to read.

Be careful with "freeware" fonts. While they can give you more design options, fonts available for free on the Internet may be "home made," and might not be published with the same quality and attention to detail as commercial fonts. Corruptions are common and duplicate font ID numbers are SURE to arise.

DON'T install more fonts than you need. From what we've seen, some 90-95% of all professional advertising and design work uses a basic group of only 30-40 font families. Installing hundreds of extra fonts burdens your system with dead weight - a sure formula for problems.

Even if you use Postscript Fonts exclusively, the MacOS system software and some applications will install a few TrueType fonts that they require. An easy way to handle this is to leave the TrueType Fonts in your system's Fonts Folder, and use a Font Management Utility to organize Postscript Fonts in a separate folder on your hard drive.

NEVER install two copies of the same font.

NEVER use fonts that reside on a server. Your computer may bomb any time it is started when the server is not available.

NEVER install TrueType and Postscript versions of the same font.

NEVER keep more than one copy of a font on your hard drive.

ALWAYS keep backup copies of your entire Font Library. Font corruptions are VERY common. Installing a clean backup copy is usually the only way to solve corruption problems.

If you use ATM, throw away unnecessary bitmap (screen) font files in your font suitcases. ATM only needs ONE bitmap font file per type style. If the suitcase contains various point sizes, you can throw away all but one size. Keep either a 10-point or 12-point bitmap font installed whenever possible.

Keep font "sharing" to a minimum. It's usually illegal, and it can quickly lead to conflicts and errors.

Keep all your fonts organized. This takes time and patience, but it will help you install and use fonts with fewer problems. We like to organize fonts alphabetically.

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HOME . SERVICES . HELP DESK . RESOURCES . WHY MAC . CREDENTIALS

Copyright 1998, 5-Minute Mac Consulting, Wampum, Pennsylvania, USA

Help: How it Works: 7 of 9
All About Fonts Macintosh users - particularly publishing professionals - have a love/hate relationship with fonts. They LOVE that the Mac makes it so easy to install and use different fonts and typefaces - especially in comparison to what Wintel users have to go through. But, they HATE the fact that managing large font libraries can become a nightmare. No matter how long this page might be, it could never fully explain the subject of font management. Entire books can - and have - been written on the subject. If you're a publishing professional, this page probably won't have the answers you're looking for. In the time and space allowed, we'll only be able to discuss the basics. Why We Use Fonts: Fonts are the data files our computers use to display and print specific typefaces. Fonts add variety to our documents. They allow us to emphasize key phrases. And, they give documents "personality." Some fonts demand attention, and some seem to whisper. Some appear to be feminine, while others are more masculine. Some convey emotions, while others appear bland and boring. Some are easy to read in small sizes, while others can be read at great distances. About Font Files, Styles and Families: Each font file contains the instructions your Mac needs to create the letter shapes for all characters, numerals and punctuation marks in a single typeface. And, each typeface may be available in several basic styles (Plain or Roman, Bold, Italic and Bold-Italic), with a separate font file to define each style. In addition, there may be other fonts in the font "family." For example, beyond the four basic styles available for most fonts, a complete font family might include Light, Heavy, Thin, SemiBold, Condensed Italic, UltraBold Italic, and dozens of other styles. It is this variety of font styles and families that makes font management such a difficult task. Finally, you need to understand that each font file must do two jobs equally well: Look clear and smooth on your monitor screen, AND print correctly to a wide variety of printers. To accomplish these two tasks, the industry has created and accepted two completely different types of fonts: TrueType and Postscript. About TrueType Fonts: TrueType fonts are a joint creation of Apple and Microsoft, and were designed specifically for use in basic home and office environments. The advantage of TrueType fonts is that they do an acceptable job of looking good both on screen, and when printed to ink jet printers, no matter what size you define. They are able to accomplish both tasks by relying on QuickDraw technology which, in the simplest of terms, first creates your monitor screen image and then uses that image as a blueprint for "drawing" a printed page. In the Fonts Sampler window below, you can see that the font "Charcoal" has the icon of a TrueType font: A page marked with three small "A" characters. About Postscript Fonts: Postscript fonts were created by the Adobe Corporation, specifically for use with laser printers that use Adobe's Postscript page description language. They create the sharpest printed image at any size, on any laser printer or professional output device. These are the fonts used by publishing professionals! But, these printer-emphasized fonts aren't so great for onscreen display. So, Adobe's engineers decided to give each Postscript font two parts. One is called the "Outline" (Printer) font. In the window below, this component is identified by the large "A" in a red striped field. (NOTE: This is Adobe's printer font icon. The icon used for printer fonts will vary depending on the manufacturer. But, if you view your fonts as a "List" in a Finder window, printer fonts will ALWAYS show that they are "Postscript Fonts.") Postscript printer fonts contain the instructions your laser printer needs to draw the font on paper perfectly at any size. The second part of a Postscript Font is the "bitmap" (screen) component. The screen font icon is always the same. As shown below, it looks like a page document with a single large "A." You will also notice that bitmap fonts contain a number in their name - in this case "Courier 12." That is the "point size" of the screen font, the exact letter size this particular font will draw correctly on your screen. Most Postscript font packages include several screen fonts to draw characters on screen at different sizes. The most common sizes are 10, 12, 14, 18, 24 and 36 points. About Adobe Type Manager: You've probably identified the problem with Postscript fonts already: What if you select a type size like "16 points" that isn't available as an installed bitmap screen font? In most cases, the character will display on screen very poorly, with jagged edges and a strange shape. Adobe, however, was quick to develop a solution to this problem: Adobe Type Manager (ATM). As you can tell from its icon (above) ATM is a Control Panel. Its job is to use the Postscript PRINTER file data as a blueprint for creating bitmap versions of each character that will look correct on screen. ATM is no longer available as a stand-alone product because it's now a component of Adobe's ATM Deluxe software - which also provides powerful font management capabilities. The standard ATM Control Panel, however, is included with all Adobe products, including their Adobe Acrobat Reader software (used for viewing Portable Document Format ".pdf" files), which is available as a free download from the Adobe web site. About Font Substitution: When you install ATM (or ATM Deluxe) two new Postscript fonts (bitmap font suitcases and outline printer fonts) will be installed in your system: Adobe Sans and Adobe Serif. These are "generic" fonts (similar to Helvetica and Times, respectively) that ATM uses to display and print documents which contain fonts you don't have installed. Which Type of Fonts Should You Use: HOME USERS: If you are a home user, with only an ink jet printer, you should probably use only TrueType fonts. You won't see any advantage from using Postscript professional fonts. BUSINESS OFFICE: If you primarily use a Laser printer in a small office environment with simple text printing needs, you CAN use both Postscript and TrueType fonts. (NOTE: Another function of ATM is to improve the printed appearance of TrueType fonts on Postscript laser printers.) However, we recommend against mixing font types to avoid the possibility of installing both the TrueType and Postscript versions of the same font. This can cause "font conflicts" that make your system unstable. Most often we suggest using TrueType fonts with ATM installed. PUBLISHING PROFESSIONALS: If you are a professional publisher who prints to Postscript laser printers, high-end color ink jets and high-resolution output devices (Linotronic), you should avoid TrueType fonts completely. (Keep only those four your computer needs to function: Chicago, Monaco, Geneva and Charcoal.) TrueType fonts are notorious for creating printing problems on high-end Postscript printing devices. About Suitcases: Inside your Mac, fonts are stored in "suitcases," a specialized type of folder. Most often, font suitcases are located in the Fonts Folder inside your System Folder. A basic set of font suitcases is installed by the MacOS system software. Other applications, especially web browsers and games, may also install their own required fonts. Both TrueType font files, and the Bitmap (screen) portion of Postscript font files should always be stored in Suitcases. You CAN include fonts from several different families in a single suitcase, but - for purposes of organization - it's best to limit each suitcase to only one font family. The Outline (printer) components of Postscript fonts should be placed in the same folder as the suitcases containing their corresponding outline font files, but NOT inside the suitcases themselves. The Required Fonts: There are four TrueType Font Suitcases that ALWAYS need to be installed in the Fonts Folder inside your System Folder: Charcoal (Only in MacOS 8+), Geneva, Monaco and Chicago. These are the four fonts that your Mac uses to draw and display your desktop. In addition, four other fonts - in either the Postscript (suitcase full of bitmap font files AND outline printer files) or TrueType versions (but, never BOTH), should be in your system's Fonts Folder: Times, Courier, Helvetica and Symbol. These are critical files that set the standards for how your computer displays all other fonts. Any other fonts can also be installed in the system's Fonts Folder. But, we strongly recommend that if you have more than 50 font suitcases installed, you should purchase a Font Management Utility. Font Management Utilities: As we mentioned earlier, ATM Deluxe is the best on the market. Aside from making both printed and onscreen fonts look their best, this software also checks fonts for corruptions, identifies duplicate TrueType and Postscript Fonts, resolves some font conflicts, activates only those fonts you need (which reduces RAM requirements and increases system stability) and allows you to store all but the basic fonts listed above in a separate Fonts Folder anywhere on your hard drive. For overall stability, ATM Deluxe is a must-have utility for any professional computer user. (We've seen professional publishing systems contain more than 3,000 different font suitcases!) Font Numbers and Names: Each font, either TrueType of Postscript, SHOULD have a unique name. You should NEVER change the names of your font files!!! (Changing suitcase names is allowed.) However, with the many thousands of fonts in the world, you may run across two fonts (or the same font from two different manufacturers) that share the same name. This WILL cause font conflicts, system errors and bombs. (NOTE: When an application looks for a font, it ALWAYS makes its request for a specific font NAME.) Each individual font style also has a unique invisible code number. Again, there are now so many fonts that number conflicts are quite common. If you use a Font Management Utility like ATM Deluxe, it will attempt to assign one of the conflicting fonts a new ID number. This is OK if the fonts are ONLY used on one machine (Font numbers are part of the Mac's internal font management scheme.) But, in office environments, where fonts are often "shared" (check your licenses carefully) this can be a problem. For example, if YOUR machine has changed the ID number for one or two font styles, that's fine. But, if you then try to use those fonts on another machine - where their new font ID numbers are already in use - the Mac may have problems identifying and displaying that particular font style correctly. Font Versions: As if the whole subject wasn't confusing enough, you also need to remember that manufacturers occasionally "upgrade" their fonts. This is often a problem when older documents use an older version of the font. If a new version is installed, older documents may have problems printing, (they usually generate a Postscript error) or text will rewrap due to variances in how the font is displayed on screen. Solving Font Problems: For most Macintosh users, font problems are extremely rare. But for desktop publishing professionals with hundreds or thousands of fonts installed, problems may creep up quite often. Since it would be almost impossible to suggest methods to fix all of the font problems and conflicts you might encounter, perhaps the best advice is to follow these suggestions to help avoid conflicts before they arise. USE fonts intelligently. Professional designers will tell you that most people use too many "trendy" fonts, which make their documents confusing, unattractive and hard to read. Be careful with "freeware" fonts. While they can give you more design options, fonts available for free on the Internet may be "home made," and might not be published with the same quality and attention to detail as commercial fonts. Corruptions are common and duplicate font ID numbers are SURE to arise. DON'T install more fonts than you need. From what we've seen, some 90-95% of all professional advertising and design work uses a basic group of only 30-40 font families. Installing hundreds of extra fonts burdens your system with dead weight - a sure formula for problems. Even if you use Postscript Fonts exclusively, the MacOS system software and some applications will install a few TrueType fonts that they require. An easy way to handle this is to leave the TrueType Fonts in your system's Fonts Folder, and use a Font Management Utility to organize Postscript Fonts in a separate folder on your hard drive. NEVER install two copies of the same font. NEVER use fonts that reside on a server. Your computer may bomb any time it is started when the server is not available. NEVER install TrueType and Postscript versions of the same font. NEVER keep more than one copy of a font on your hard drive. ALWAYS keep backup copies of your entire Font Library. Font corruptions are VERY common. Installing a clean backup copy is usually the only way to solve corruption problems. If you use ATM, throw away unnecessary bitmap (screen) font files in your font suitcases. ATM only needs ONE bitmap font file per type style. If the suitcase contains various point sizes, you can throw away all but one size. Keep either a 10-point or 12-point bitmap font installed whenever possible. Keep font "sharing" to a minimum. It's usually illegal, and it can quickly lead to conflicts and errors. Keep all your fonts organized. This takes time and patience, but it will help you install and use fonts with fewer problems. We like to organize fonts alphabetically.
BACK		NEXT

HOME . SERVICES . HELP DESK . RESOURCES . WHY MAC . CREDENTIALS
Copyright 1998, 5-Minute Mac Consulting, Wampum, Pennsylvania, USA