OT ? Font Manager

[Chester Harold]

I figured that since a lot of FW usage was font-based, this question was
only 50% OT. It was spurred by the recent font-centric thread, which was a
good one.

I have around 1000 fonts, maybe more. It is such a pain to (1) try to match
a font by wading through the list, (2) try to locate a font with a
particular look.

What I have wanted for a long time is to have a utility that will allow me
to sort fonts into categories and subcategories, etc. For example,
serif/formal or cursive/informal/festive and so forth.

Does anyone use a good font manager? There may be other capabilities that I
don't even know I need yet, so feel free to give any suggestions.

Thanks,
Chet

[Conjurer]

Adobe Type Manager does that, not cheap though.

Don't know any freebies, maybe some others will come up with some.

[Pat]

Chet:

> I figured that since a lot of FW usage was font-based, this question was
> only 50% OT. It was spurred by the recent font-centric thread, which was

a

> good one.
>
> I have around 1000 fonts, maybe more. It is such a pain to (1) try to

match

> a font by wading through the list, (2) try to locate a font with a
> particular look.
>
> What I have wanted for a long time is to have a utility that will allow me
> to sort fonts into categories and subcategories, etc. For example,
> serif/formal or cursive/informal/festive and so forth.
>
> Does anyone use a good font manager? There may be other capabilities that

I

> don't even know I need yet, so feel free to give any suggestions.

There are a few programs around you might want to look at. You can search on
Google for "font managers" or some of the shareware sites like
[url]www.tucows.com[/url] and [url]www.cnet.com[/url] . Some of the large font sites also list
font managers. There are some nice, inexpensive font managers available. I'd
also look for one that also installs and uninstall fonts as well as organize
them into categories. I use Bitstream Font Manager, but that was a included
free with with CorelDraw.

Regards, Pat

[Craig Hartel]

Chester Harold wrote:

> I figured that since a lot of FW usage was font-based, this question was
> only 50% OT. It was spurred by the recent font-centric thread, which was a
> good one.
>
> I have around 1000 fonts, maybe more. It is such a pain to (1) try to match
> a font by wading through the list, (2) try to locate a font with a
> particular look.
>
> What I have wanted for a long time is to have a utility that will allow me
> to sort fonts into categories and subcategories, etc. For example,
> serif/formal or cursive/informal/festive and so forth.
>
> Does anyone use a good font manager? There may be other capabilities that I
> don't even know I need yet, so feel free to give any suggestions.
>
> Thanks,
> Chet
>
>

Try Sue Fisher's "The Font Thing." It's been around for a while, and is
totally free. I have used it quite a bit with no real hassles.

[url]http://members.ozemail.com.au/~scef/tft.html[/url]

--
Craig Hartel
==================================================
I recommend:

COMMUNITYMX - [url]http://www.communitymx.com/free.cfm[/url]
BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO DREAMWEAVER AND FIREWORKS
[url]http://www.dw-fw-beginners.com[/url]
CBT CAFE - [url]http://www.cbtcafe.com[/url]
PLAYING WITH FIRE - [url]http://www.playingwithfire.com[/url]
PHIREWORX - [url]http://www.phireworx.com[/url]
RICHIEBEE - [url]http://www.richiebee.ca[/url]
ULTRAWEAVER - [url]http://www.ultraweaver.com[/url]
PVII - PROJECT SEVEN - [url]http://www.projectseven.com[/url]

[Peter Connolly]

> What I have wanted for a long time is to have a utility that will allow me

> to sort fonts into categories and subcategories, etc. For example,
> serif/formal or cursive/informal/festive and so forth.
>
> Does anyone use a good font manager? There may be other capabilities that

I

> don't even know I need yet, so feel free to give any suggestions.

Chet,

I use Extensis Suitcase - it's a defacto standard amongst Mac users, and the
PC version (which I have) is just as good. It *is* commercial software,
however - but you can get a trial download at [url]http://www.extensis.com[/url].

The part I like about Suitcase is that you only load into memory the fonts
you use on a regular basis. The rest are held on disk; Suitcase lets you
preview them, and any font or collection can be activated on a permanent or
temporary basis as you need them.

HTH,

Pete.
--

Peter Connolly
[url]http://www.acutecomputing.co.uk[/url]
Derby
UK

[Ilya Razmanov]

"Chester Harold" <chet@no-spam.com> wrote in message
news:blatud$c7v$1@forums.macromedia.com...

> I figured that since a lot of FW usage was font-based, this question was
> only 50% OT. It was spurred by the recent font-centric thread, which was

a

> good one.
>
> I have around 1000 fonts, maybe more. It is such a pain to (1) try to

match

> a font by wading through the list, (2) try to locate a font with a
> particular look.
>
> What I have wanted for a long time is to have a utility that will allow me
> to sort fonts into categories and subcategories, etc. For example,
> serif/formal or cursive/informal/festive and so forth.
>
> Does anyone use a good font manager? There may be other capabilities that

I

> don't even know I need yet, so feel free to give any suggestions.
>
> Thanks,
> Chet
>
>

The stuff from [url]http://www.moonsoftware.com/[/url] looks good to me. I've heared
MANY good things about The Font Thing as well, although when I first tried
it, it had some problems with Cyrillic stuff - that was important to me, but
may be not that much imprtant to you.

Ilyich.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ilya Razmanov (a.k.a. Ilyich the Toad)
[url]http://photoshop.msk.ru/[/url] - Photoshop plug-in filters
"Should we interrogate them, Sam? Or just start
breaking up the furniture?" - Max, Sam and Max "Surfin' the highway"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

[darrel]

> Adobe Type Manager does that, not cheap though.

But if you can afford 1000 typefaces, I'm sure you can afford ATM.

If you are on a Mac, the newest OS will have a type manager built in.

-Darrel

[Chester Harold]

I am on Win. I have never bought a typeface and never stolen one. They all
just came with various software I bought. 5 or 10 years ago it seems that
all software came with a few dozen fonts. I still have those disks.

Chet

"darrel" <notreal@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:blc5hg$37p$1@forums.macromedia.com...

> > Adobe Type Manager does that, not cheap though.

>
> But if you can afford 1000 typefaces, I'm sure you can afford ATM.
>
> If you are on a Mac, the newest OS will have a type manager built in.
>
> -Darrel
>
>
>

[darrel]

> I am on Win. I have never bought a typeface and never stolen one. They
all

> just came with various software I bought.

Well, maybe a better solution is to just cull the list.

IMHO, a good set of 5-10 regularly used fonts is all you need for 90% of
projects. Maybe print out your catalog of fonts, install a good, core set,
and then, when you do need a different font, just reference your print out.

Just something to consider...

-Darrel

[Sam Poikail]

"Chester Harold" <chet@no-spam.com> wrote in message
news:blatud$c7v$1@forums.macromedia.com...

> I figured that since a lot of FW usage was font-based, this question was
> only 50% OT. It was spurred by the recent font-centric thread, which was

a

> good one.

Definitely on-topic. While you might CSS to style your sites with standard
fonts, it seems that using fonts as graphical elements to give you site a
bit more personality (within reason) is still a good thing.

> I have around 1000 fonts, maybe more. It is such a pain to (1) try to

match

> a font by wading through the list, (2) try to locate a font with a
> particular look.

Have no idea how it happened, but I am currently running with over 3900
commercial fonts installed (not activated) ;o) and it can definitely be a
pain.

> What I have wanted for a long time is to have a utility that will allow me
> to sort fonts into categories and subcategories, etc. For example,
> serif/formal or cursive/informal/festive and so forth.

You are talking about font-families and font-sets. Most font managers
support sets (which you define) and if you are lucky font-families which are
pre-defined by font names and/or type foundries.

> Does anyone use a good font manager?

Definitely take a look at Sue Fisher's Font thing (Windows only). Only
caveat is that it hasn't been updated in a while. Win 2K and XP are not
explicitly supported though they probably work fine.

>There may be other capabilities that I
> don't even know I need yet, so feel free to give any suggestions.

Features to look for:

-) Grouping by font families and/or font sets.
-) Auto-activation of fonts
-) Font repair or at least identification of corrupted fonts.
-) The ability to print out font key mappings (especially if you are a fan
of Dingbat fonts).

Take a look at several font managers and you will probably find some other
features you want or need.

Currently, I am using Suitcase 9.2 ([url]www.extensis.com[/url]) because they had a
offer running earlier this year. It is a workable solution, but if I were
in the market again I would probably lean towards Font Reserve
([url]www.diamondsoft.com[/url]) or Font Agent ([url]www.insidersoftware.com[/url]).

Extensis recently acquired Diamondsoft so hopefully some features will be
folded into Suitcase. Currently you can buy either product though.

Cheers,
Sam

[Chester Harold]

Very many thanks for the suggestions. I will evaluate all of the mentioned
font managers this week or ASAP, because I need one. In reading the
features, none of them listed user-driven hierarchical organization which is
the #1 feature I am after. However, maybe it is in there and I will see it
during the eval. If not, does anyone know if there is a font manager that
features a tree view organization of fonts?

Thanks, Chet

[Ilya Razmanov]

"Chester Harold" <chet@no-spam.com> wrote in message
news:blf1er$7v5$1@forums.macromedia.com...

> Very many thanks for the suggestions. I will evaluate all of the

mentioned

> font managers this week or ASAP, because I need one. In reading the
> features, none of them listed user-driven hierarchical organization which

is

> the #1 feature I am after. However, maybe it is in there and I will see

it

> during the eval. If not, does anyone know if there is a font manager that
> features a tree view organization of fonts?
>
> Thanks, Chet
>

The one I mentioned (Font Loader) provides something like this - it allows
you to group font files by the directories, and load\unload them
accordingly. It's not that I'm insisting that this is the best one - it
worked fine for me, but by all means give a try to the others. As I already
mentioned, for me having proper Cyrillic support was very important. For
you, something else may be of much more importance - give them all a try.

Ilyich.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ilya Razmanov (a.k.a. Ilyich the Toad)
[url]http://photoshop.msk.ru/[/url] - Photoshop plug-in filters
"How did I get into this mess? I really don't know how. We
seem to be made to suffer. It's our lot in life." - C3PO, Star Wars
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Chester Harold]

Thanks again. Since the site doesn't mention that feature, your reply was
very helpful.

Chet

[toxo_q webforumsuser@macromedia.com]

Typograph is the best on Windows OS
See the references:

"Typograf is one of the best font utilities we've seen, commercial or shareware."
Point Central: "Definitely a must."
ZDNet Rating: 5 points out of 5
Rocketdownload: 5 point out of 5
5star shareware: 5 points out of 5
BlueChillies: 4 point out of 5
FileHungry: 5 points out of 5
Software Files: ...

View and preview fonts
Display all OpenType, TrueType and Type 1 fonts on hard disks, DVD, CD, opticals, floppies or particular folders including all sub folders. Sorts viewed fonts by name, file, family, copyright, width, date, size.
Typograf displays following font types:
OpenType and TrueType fonts (preview, installed, loaded by Typograf)
PostScript Type 1 fonts (preview, installed, loaded by Typograf) - free ATM Light required
Printer fonts
Raster or bitmap fonts (system fonts)

Display all font properties
font information: full name, family name, creator, version, copyright, trademark, ...
file data: size, date, file location path.
typeface classification by PANOSE system, IBM Font Classes or the Windows internal metric structure
character set
keyboard layout
zoom view for details
edit font information

Compare fonts
Find similar fonts according to the typeface classifications
Compare several fonts tabularly according to important font features, file data, character width, number of kerning pairs, ...
Finds font duplicates on disk, DVD, CD, ...

Print fonts
Print 1, 6, 20, 40 or 80 fonts on a A4 page.
Two kind of sample page of a font including character set.
Print character set, keyboard layout

Font file management functions
Copy, move, delete font files.
Load or unload fonts
Install or uninstall fonts

Manage fonts in database and font groups
Keep your TrueType and PostScript fonts in order using the font database and font groups.
Catalog all your fonts with the database. Thus you alway know on which DVD, CD-ROM or folder your fonts are.
Organize your fonts in font groups to load them as needed.

Information about typefaces and typography
TrueType and Type 1 Reference
Typeface Classifications
Mixing & Matching Typefaces
Choosing an appropriate Type
Typesetting

See for more the referring URL






Referring URLs
[url]http://www.neuber.com/typograph/index.html[/url]

[Chester Harold]

Thanks, I'll add that to my list for review.