FC and MT have come in handy reorganizing my font library. I look forward to creating some fonts of my own down the road.
I have encountered a number of problem files and would appreciate any advice on the best methods for dealing with them in FC/MT. Sorry, I didn't make careful notes as I went. My actual questions are highlighted.
1. Alphabetic files with symbol = true
So far, I've encountered three types. The majority are easily fixed in FC with the Format Platform Manager and Format Settings command.
A small number of files, those in which the Classification had a Family Kind of Pictorial and a Class of Symbolic, have proved immune to resetting to symbol - false even after all Classification changes have been made.
**Am I overlooking something?
An even smaller number of files contain their letters in unmarked glyphs. If these are sorted, it produces a scramble. The only way I have found to deal with such files is to copy the letters one by one into a new file.
**Is there a less time-consuming way to fix such files?
2. Files that show up as Unknown Font in MT.
If I'm not mistaken, these have all been .otf files and any changes I've tried to make in FC get saved as .ttf.
**Does the change from .otf to .ttf imply a loss of any of the open type functionality? How do you suggest dealing with such fonts?
3. Fonts that show up as <font not found> in MT (I think that's the msg; I fixed them all). These seem to fix miraculously if anything is done to them and saved in FC.
**Anything to know about what causes this msg?
4. Fonts that show up fine initially in MT and FC but the True Type glyph is not showing in Windows Explorer. Often these fonts will not display correctly in the Sample area of MT, having either letters displayed down the left margin one at a time or having a normal display except for an overlay along the left margin.
Most of these I've been able to fix. There are two problem areas. Unpredictably, some fonts once "fixed" display only in tiny type in the MT Preview Text and Characters windows. The seem to display fine in FC, and they seem to work fine in applications (Word) with or without being "fixed" in FC.
**Is there a way to correct the display of these files in MT? (BTW, one font, Bastarda Plain, displays larger in this circumstance rather than smaller.)
The second problem area has proved catastrophic as far as saving the file. When I go to save my fixes in FC, I get an Out of Range error message. If I recall correctly, other error messages have mentioned Bounds. In either case, I have not been able to find a way to savage these files and, once I quit FC, they show up as 0 kb.
**How do I save the files when I get those error msgs?
Finally,
**Any and all advice on good file maintenance in a large font library will be most appreciated. Are there any things you would recomend be checked/changed as a routine with font files? Are there common deficiencies in fonts that can be corrected in FC? Any clever suggestions for being able to clear duplicate files from MT or being able to quickly lay your hands on a particular font when you can't quite remember which category you saved it in?
Thanks very much. I've enjoyed your programs these past few weeks.
Fixing Problem and Broken Files
-
Dick Pape
- Top Typographer
- Posts: 1360
- Joined: Wed Oct 01, 2003 1:19 pm
- Location: North Dallas, Texas
How To Do It All
Hi Charlie - welcome to the Forum. (Been a long hot summer with one day of winter! Lucky You Come Texas!)
You posted a very long note so I get a chance to respond likewise!
----------
1. Alphabetic files with Symbol = True. They're easily seen in MT and drag and dropped to FC.
---a. Check Format/Platform Manager: Change Symbol to Microsoft Unicode BMP Only.
---b. Format/Settings - Classification (Panose)/Family Kind = Pictorial and Font Family/Class = Symbolic
---c. I recalculate Format Settings/Metrics. (Not sure why they change when going from Platform to Platform but cleans up line spacing anyway.)
---d. Format/Settings/Ranges: Recalculate Average Character Width. Recalculate Unicode Character Ranges. Recalculate Code Page Character Ranges. (This is probably the one you miss).
That's all that's generally needed.
To Test - do (F5) Font Test and check window in top line. Should say ANSI rather than Symbol. I think that's the proof every thing is correctly entered.
--Unmarked glyphs are due to Postscript names not being enabled. Go to Format/Post... Check Include Postscript Names and press Generate Names. This should rename each glyph to the current mapping. If they are still messed it is possible the maps are messed and have to be corrected.
The way I tend to do this is get either Macintosh or Microsoft maps correct (and normally one is ok to begin with) then delete the other Platform and re-add it and "Add Character to Glyph Index Mappings" by selecting either Copy from Macintosh (if you are readding Microsoft) or Generate from Postscript - depending on which is correct.
Worst case you have to remap all characters for one platform and then use this to copy (readd) to the second platform. (There may be an easier way to do this -- but this is straightforward and keeps font names the same.)
-- Scrambled glyphs (after doing the above) likely means the maps were messed to begin with. I would manually remap (Format/Mappings) if necessary. Very few fonts are truly scrambled thank garsh. Unmapped glyphs show as tiny square in upper left corner. They have to be manually assigned or cannot be referenced anywhere.
The time-consuming part for me is to manually remap a font. The routines could be improved to make it easier to move from glyph to glyph without having to move the slider bar up to the next 5 fonts etc. After awhile you understand the sorting order of letters so map assignments are straightforward (adding 1) to prior map.
----------
2. Files that show up as Unknown Font in MT -- some may be invalid in FC and if so cannot be fixed. Often FC can simply Autoname the font to correct it. Drag it to FC to see.
--> I don't think MT cares if it's otf or not. FC will change them to TTF when saved -- true. There is no loss of Microsoft Open Type functionality afaik. It does remove the Type1 routines - afaik.
----------
3. Fonts that show up as <font not found> -- This is caused when font names are messed.
--> Format/Naming will show missing critical entries and can be quickly proven by trying to (F5) Font Test and get the red error msg "Font is not valid, make sure all required Microsoft Naming Fields are available".
--> Go to Format/Naming to check -- sometimes the names are in Unicodes such as: \0627\0644\0633\0644\0627\0645. They have to be changed to Latin letters.
--> Sometimes naming fields are missing. Easiest fix is use Tools/Autonaming, Next, Next and the names should be repaired. Again, the proof of concept is (F5) Font Test. (I'm surprised to find out they fix automatically for this problem -- will have to test.)
----------
4. "Fonts that show up fine" -- this covers a variety of likely topics. I'll outline a few possibilities:
--a. Format/Settings/Layout/Units per em. If this is at variance with the physical size of the glyph you can adjust either the Units Per Em and/or Tools/Glyph Transformer/Output/Scale until you get the right proportion... Generally I would set Units per em to some common value (1000, 1024, 2048) and use the Glyph Transformer until things were right.
--b. It is possible the Glyph Metrics are wrong and using Tools/Autometrics can fix really messed alignments. It works "perfectly" for vertical fonts, but oblique or italic fonts may need special analysis.
--c. If I remember the Bastarda Plain has very large glyphs. Easily they can be adjusted down by one of the two methods above: changing units per em or using Glyph Transformer. (Thats one of the few I think I've enountered which are extremely large...)
--d. I think I fix the Out of Range errors by deleting all blank glyphs (Edit/Select Incomplete and Delete) and then look for glyphs which are apparently blank or weird looking. Those may hold messed shapes causing the problem. You might look at each and see if it's repairable -- but be careful sometimes they will lock up the system and you'll lose the FC session. (Be careful trying to Validate these for the same reason.)
At this time, I tend to look at the letter from the thumbnail view and then just delete it without looking further. I can always add a glyph and form a new character if I have to. More often than not they are not repairable even if you can edit the letter.
----------
5. Good Maintenance Practices. I have an earlier post which rather describes the whole setup better. But, in summary:
--a. Rename them to the internal font name (use a renaming program).
--b. Store all fonts in a single alphabetic file. There are programs to help this. I have 107 alphabetic groups so that no group exceeds ~15,000 fonts.
--c. Replace Windows Explorer with (another program) because it will walk through large font files without pausing at each one. It reads fonts as quickly as Windows Explorer reads jpg or bmp files. (It handles my 15k folders which are deadly in Explorer.) I use it to scan/find Vendors or Names of the entire file. Very fast and very needed.
--d. Use (a program) to find duplicate fonts. This one lets you match on filename (or parts of file name), and/or file size (or delta/variance in size) and/or file date (or a variance) and/or CRC. You need all 4 variables.
I can drop 50% of new fonts without looking at them if they are Same Name and Same Size and Same Date. By varying these parameters I can get potential duplicates down to about 20% before I have to look at each one. My goal is to replace old fonts with updated (new versions) and have valid "same name" duplicates. The only way to do this is to see if the vendor is different or if the design is different or if the Version or internal date is different. By cutting out the "chaff" I have enough energy (or daylight) to get to the wheat.
e. MT should be your font classifier with Groups. Look at a font and assign it to a group. I would use Shortcuts or Copy -- but never Move from the main folder. Copies are good because you can "correct" them with FC and still have the original version to fall back to. If you don't like a category -- delete the Group or Copy. Has no impact on your Master File.
As far as checking fonts I do the following on all fonts:
--1. Make sure it's readable. MT shows two readability errors by sorting on Font Type to get messages of <Font not accessible> or unknown font type. Fix these in FC. IF FC can't read them == I delete them.
--2. Fix Symbol vs Alphabetic platforms. Find them in MT and fix them in FC.
--3. For all fonts of "special interest" in FC I check all the Format entries, Font/Validate and Tools/Autoname. I definitely put in the Classification/Panose Family Kind value which I can use in MT.
There may be quite a few entries but they are generally one-button fixes and will standardize my fonts. Often Date Created and Date Modified are defaulted to Jan 1, 1904. Easy to fix it to Today for documentation purposes.
It may take 2-3 minutes per font == but it's forever corrected.
Hope you learn to work with these programs and understand their features -- they are very well designed and written and I love them a lot!!
You posted a very long note so I get a chance to respond likewise!
----------
1. Alphabetic files with Symbol = True. They're easily seen in MT and drag and dropped to FC.
---a. Check Format/Platform Manager: Change Symbol to Microsoft Unicode BMP Only.
---b. Format/Settings - Classification (Panose)/Family Kind = Pictorial and Font Family/Class = Symbolic
---c. I recalculate Format Settings/Metrics. (Not sure why they change when going from Platform to Platform but cleans up line spacing anyway.)
---d. Format/Settings/Ranges: Recalculate Average Character Width. Recalculate Unicode Character Ranges. Recalculate Code Page Character Ranges. (This is probably the one you miss).
That's all that's generally needed.
To Test - do (F5) Font Test and check window in top line. Should say ANSI rather than Symbol. I think that's the proof every thing is correctly entered.
--Unmarked glyphs are due to Postscript names not being enabled. Go to Format/Post... Check Include Postscript Names and press Generate Names. This should rename each glyph to the current mapping. If they are still messed it is possible the maps are messed and have to be corrected.
The way I tend to do this is get either Macintosh or Microsoft maps correct (and normally one is ok to begin with) then delete the other Platform and re-add it and "Add Character to Glyph Index Mappings" by selecting either Copy from Macintosh (if you are readding Microsoft) or Generate from Postscript - depending on which is correct.
Worst case you have to remap all characters for one platform and then use this to copy (readd) to the second platform. (There may be an easier way to do this -- but this is straightforward and keeps font names the same.)
-- Scrambled glyphs (after doing the above) likely means the maps were messed to begin with. I would manually remap (Format/Mappings) if necessary. Very few fonts are truly scrambled thank garsh. Unmapped glyphs show as tiny square in upper left corner. They have to be manually assigned or cannot be referenced anywhere.
The time-consuming part for me is to manually remap a font. The routines could be improved to make it easier to move from glyph to glyph without having to move the slider bar up to the next 5 fonts etc. After awhile you understand the sorting order of letters so map assignments are straightforward (adding 1) to prior map.
----------
2. Files that show up as Unknown Font in MT -- some may be invalid in FC and if so cannot be fixed. Often FC can simply Autoname the font to correct it. Drag it to FC to see.
--> I don't think MT cares if it's otf or not. FC will change them to TTF when saved -- true. There is no loss of Microsoft Open Type functionality afaik. It does remove the Type1 routines - afaik.
----------
3. Fonts that show up as <font not found> -- This is caused when font names are messed.
--> Format/Naming will show missing critical entries and can be quickly proven by trying to (F5) Font Test and get the red error msg "Font is not valid, make sure all required Microsoft Naming Fields are available".
--> Go to Format/Naming to check -- sometimes the names are in Unicodes such as: \0627\0644\0633\0644\0627\0645. They have to be changed to Latin letters.
--> Sometimes naming fields are missing. Easiest fix is use Tools/Autonaming, Next, Next and the names should be repaired. Again, the proof of concept is (F5) Font Test. (I'm surprised to find out they fix automatically for this problem -- will have to test.)
----------
4. "Fonts that show up fine" -- this covers a variety of likely topics. I'll outline a few possibilities:
--a. Format/Settings/Layout/Units per em. If this is at variance with the physical size of the glyph you can adjust either the Units Per Em and/or Tools/Glyph Transformer/Output/Scale until you get the right proportion... Generally I would set Units per em to some common value (1000, 1024, 2048) and use the Glyph Transformer until things were right.
--b. It is possible the Glyph Metrics are wrong and using Tools/Autometrics can fix really messed alignments. It works "perfectly" for vertical fonts, but oblique or italic fonts may need special analysis.
--c. If I remember the Bastarda Plain has very large glyphs. Easily they can be adjusted down by one of the two methods above: changing units per em or using Glyph Transformer. (Thats one of the few I think I've enountered which are extremely large...)
--d. I think I fix the Out of Range errors by deleting all blank glyphs (Edit/Select Incomplete and Delete) and then look for glyphs which are apparently blank or weird looking. Those may hold messed shapes causing the problem. You might look at each and see if it's repairable -- but be careful sometimes they will lock up the system and you'll lose the FC session. (Be careful trying to Validate these for the same reason.)
At this time, I tend to look at the letter from the thumbnail view and then just delete it without looking further. I can always add a glyph and form a new character if I have to. More often than not they are not repairable even if you can edit the letter.
----------
5. Good Maintenance Practices. I have an earlier post which rather describes the whole setup better. But, in summary:
--a. Rename them to the internal font name (use a renaming program).
--b. Store all fonts in a single alphabetic file. There are programs to help this. I have 107 alphabetic groups so that no group exceeds ~15,000 fonts.
--c. Replace Windows Explorer with (another program) because it will walk through large font files without pausing at each one. It reads fonts as quickly as Windows Explorer reads jpg or bmp files. (It handles my 15k folders which are deadly in Explorer.) I use it to scan/find Vendors or Names of the entire file. Very fast and very needed.
--d. Use (a program) to find duplicate fonts. This one lets you match on filename (or parts of file name), and/or file size (or delta/variance in size) and/or file date (or a variance) and/or CRC. You need all 4 variables.
I can drop 50% of new fonts without looking at them if they are Same Name and Same Size and Same Date. By varying these parameters I can get potential duplicates down to about 20% before I have to look at each one. My goal is to replace old fonts with updated (new versions) and have valid "same name" duplicates. The only way to do this is to see if the vendor is different or if the design is different or if the Version or internal date is different. By cutting out the "chaff" I have enough energy (or daylight) to get to the wheat.
e. MT should be your font classifier with Groups. Look at a font and assign it to a group. I would use Shortcuts or Copy -- but never Move from the main folder. Copies are good because you can "correct" them with FC and still have the original version to fall back to. If you don't like a category -- delete the Group or Copy. Has no impact on your Master File.
As far as checking fonts I do the following on all fonts:
--1. Make sure it's readable. MT shows two readability errors by sorting on Font Type to get messages of <Font not accessible> or unknown font type. Fix these in FC. IF FC can't read them == I delete them.
--2. Fix Symbol vs Alphabetic platforms. Find them in MT and fix them in FC.
--3. For all fonts of "special interest" in FC I check all the Format entries, Font/Validate and Tools/Autoname. I definitely put in the Classification/Panose Family Kind value which I can use in MT.
There may be quite a few entries but they are generally one-button fixes and will standardize my fonts. Often Date Created and Date Modified are defaulted to Jan 1, 1904. Easy to fix it to Today for documentation purposes.
It may take 2-3 minutes per font == but it's forever corrected.
Hope you learn to work with these programs and understand their features -- they are very well designed and written and I love them a lot!!
-
Erwin Denissen
- Moderator
- Posts: 11158
- Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2002 12:41 am
- Location: Bilthoven, The Netherlands
- Contact:
Re: Fixing Problem and Broken Files
I'm glad to see Dick has replied to your post, as he has far more experience with collecting, organizing and fixing fonts.
MainType uses specific typographic metrics from within the font file to display the font preview. You could try to improve the fonts with Font Creator. Dick gave some useful instructions.Charlie wrote:**Is there a way to correct the display of these files in MT? (BTW, one font, Bastarda Plain, displays larger in this circumstance rather than smaller.)
Please send me all those font files and I'll try to improve Font Creator, so those (corrupt) fonts will no longer generate errors.Charlie wrote:The second problem area has proved catastrophic as far as saving the file. When I go to save my fixes in FC, I get an Out of Range error message. If I recall correctly, other error messages have mentioned Bounds. In either case, I have not been able to find a way to savage these files and, once I quit FC, they show up as 0 kb.
**How do I save the files when I get those error msgs?
Wow!
Thanks, gentlemen, for the excellent in-depth reply.
Dick, it will take me some time to work through your advice in a methodical way and give it the feedback it deserves. I hope to respond in some detail in a week or so with results and remaining questions.
Erwin, I have simply deleted all files that generated catastrophic errors on attempting to save. I started with the more dispensible files, so no loss. I have 15 or 20 files left of the type that sometimes yield that problem I will be glad to forward to you (perhaps later today), but I can't guarantee they will be of the hard-to-fix variety. I can also include some of those that look okay in FC but display poorly in MT after saving, although Dick offered good advice on those that I look forward to testing out.
There's clearly a lot more functionality to FC than I gave it credit for. Some of the features I took to be low-key sound like they pack a wallop. It'll be fun getting more familiar with the two programs. Unfortunately, I have to turn to another task for a bit, but I do want follow through on these issues and learn the correct remedies that FC offers.
BTW, Dick, I'm in Flower Mound, not far from Dallas. Moved back here a couple of years ago after three decades in the SF Bay Area.
Thanks, gentlemen, for the excellent in-depth reply.
Dick, it will take me some time to work through your advice in a methodical way and give it the feedback it deserves. I hope to respond in some detail in a week or so with results and remaining questions.
Erwin, I have simply deleted all files that generated catastrophic errors on attempting to save. I started with the more dispensible files, so no loss. I have 15 or 20 files left of the type that sometimes yield that problem I will be glad to forward to you (perhaps later today), but I can't guarantee they will be of the hard-to-fix variety. I can also include some of those that look okay in FC but display poorly in MT after saving, although Dick offered good advice on those that I look forward to testing out.
There's clearly a lot more functionality to FC than I gave it credit for. Some of the features I took to be low-key sound like they pack a wallop. It'll be fun getting more familiar with the two programs. Unfortunately, I have to turn to another task for a bit, but I do want follow through on these issues and learn the correct remedies that FC offers.
BTW, Dick, I'm in Flower Mound, not far from Dallas. Moved back here a couple of years ago after three decades in the SF Bay Area.
-
Dick Pape
- Top Typographer
- Posts: 1360
- Joined: Wed Oct 01, 2003 1:19 pm
- Location: North Dallas, Texas
Hi Charlie
Insane -- why are we far from home just fussing with fonts?
I was born in Oakland. Lived in Lafayette. Went to Acalanes. Went to Berkeley. Worked in San Francisco. Lived in Brisbane! Worked in Santa Clara. Lived in Mtn View. Moved to Dallas! Not sure where I went wrong...
Small, small world! Let's meet at The Galleria for a coffee and discuss fonts and Erwin's softwares... hah!
I was born in Oakland. Lived in Lafayette. Went to Acalanes. Went to Berkeley. Worked in San Francisco. Lived in Brisbane! Worked in Santa Clara. Lived in Mtn View. Moved to Dallas! Not sure where I went wrong...
Small, small world! Let's meet at The Galleria for a coffee and discuss fonts and Erwin's softwares... hah!
Last edited by Dick Pape on Thu Mar 30, 2006 4:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
-
Dick Pape
- Top Typographer
- Posts: 1360
- Joined: Wed Oct 01, 2003 1:19 pm
- Location: North Dallas, Texas
Correction
I made another error!
Simply Tools/Autonaming solves this problem.
I had some Arabic fonts where I thought that was my error. These don't have to be changed, they just need all naming variables filled in like any true type font.sometimes the names are in Unicodes such as: \0627\0644\0633\0644\0627\0645. They have to be changed to Latin letters.
Simply Tools/Autonaming solves this problem.
-
Erwin Denissen
- Moderator
- Posts: 11158
- Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2002 12:41 am
- Location: Bilthoven, The Netherlands
- Contact:
-
Dick Pape
- Top Typographer
- Posts: 1360
- Joined: Wed Oct 01, 2003 1:19 pm
- Location: North Dallas, Texas
Hmmmmmm
Interesting. The Macintosh names for these fonts were mostly ???????????
Even after renaming.
Does that affect font functionality?
(Posted this then got message: "You cannot make another post so soon after your last; please try again in a short while." Somebody is trying to stiffle ME! Erwin??)
Even after renaming.
Does that affect font functionality?
(Posted this then got message: "You cannot make another post so soon after your last; please try again in a short while." Somebody is trying to stiffle ME! Erwin??)
-
Erwin Denissen
- Moderator
- Posts: 11158
- Joined: Fri Oct 04, 2002 12:41 am
- Location: Bilthoven, The Netherlands
- Contact:
The functionality will remain the same, but on a Mac the font name will be ???????????.Interesting. The Macintosh names for these fonts were mostly ???????????
Even after renaming.
Does that affect font functionality?
You should be able to post a new message after 15 seconds. I know you are fast, but I never knew you were that fast, or maybe you double-clicked the Submit button or did a page refresh(Posted this then got message: "You cannot make another post so soon after your last; please try again in a short while." Somebody is trying to stiffle ME! Erwin??)
