Disable active font preview?

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pentool
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Location: Seattle, WA

Disable active font preview?

Post by pentool »

Even though I have a fairly good system for what I do, I still like to keep my system fast and clean as opposed to bloated with all sorts of junk services running in the background. Which means, that when I start a project, I prefer to determine the fonts I want to use, and then I will load the needed fonts on a per project basis, as opposed to keeping all of them installed in the system. Normally I only have 247 fonts active in the system, so I know it's not a whole lot.

But still. When I run MT, the first thing it does is scanning the active font list. Now, I am not always interested to know what fonts are active, because I just want to open up MT and activate a set of fonts for my current project and then close MT. That's it. However, I can't load fonts until the scanning of active fonts has finished.

Can there be a way to disable the automatic scanning of active fonts? This could be a setting either in the preferences or maybe an on/off button or something. This would be helpful so that if I just want to activate a set of fonts, I don't have to keep waiting for the scanning to finish first.
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Dave Crosby
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by Dave Crosby »

To disable, simply click on one of the other folders - Browse or Groups.

Perhaps there should be an ability to select which folder you want for the Default Folder when MainType opens.
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pentool
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by pentool »

Maybe I did not explain it well. If you click on the other tabs as you suggest (eg Browse or Groups), the Active tab is still scanning, as you can see by the rotating icon on the tab and the numbers going up.

So just by clicking on another tab solves nothing. It's still scanning. What I was requesting is not to scan the active fonts AT ALL. Instead, there would be a button or a preference option where the user would initiate the scanning of active fonts and not the program would be doing it automatically each time it starts up.

I might not be interested waiting for a scan to finish, since in order to activate a font in a custom group, you HAVE TO WAIT until the active font scan is finished. That is what I'd like to avoid.
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Dave Crosby
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by Dave Crosby »

Yes, I agree. We need to suggest to Erwin that he add:
Dave Crosby wrote: . . . an ability to select which folder you want for the Default Folder when MainType opens.
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Dave Crosby
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by Dave Crosby »

Dave Crosby wrote:Yes, I agree. We need to suggest to Erwin that he add:
Dave Crosby wrote: . . . an ability to select which folder you want for the Default Folder when MainType opens.
Oops,

I had forgotten that you can goto Tools, Options, Fonts, Browse Fonts, and check the box:
MainTypeOptions.jpg
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pentool
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by pentool »

Dave Crosby wrote:I had forgotten that you can goto Tools, Options, Fonts, Browse Fonts, and check the box:
And so?

Dave, I am still not sure if you understand what I am asking. That checkbox has nothing to do with my request. The Windows/Fonts directory is still being scanned as the very first thing when the program starts regardless of that checkbox's setting.
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dehlers43
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by dehlers43 »

I have the same issue. It's especially bothersome when I'm working with dings or large font files.....
Dave Crosby
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by Dave Crosby »

Dave, I am still not sure if you understand what I am asking. That checkbox has nothing to do with my request. The Windows/Fonts directory is still being scanned as the very first thing when the program starts regardless of that checkbox's setting.
My observation is that the folder being browsed is scanned first, then the installed fonts.
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opeter
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by opeter »

One of the main problems here with MainType is, that it doesn't have any cache system. So every time you open it up, it needs to create preview of fonts, font caches etc. That's why it is slow. Very slow. And you can have an dual-quadcore CPU in the case with unlimited GBs of free RAM and it won't help you.
León Fridsma
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by León Fridsma »

This problem is one of the main reasons why MainType will have a big part of it's engine redesigned and rewritten from scratch with the next version.
opeter
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by opeter »

León Fridsma wrote:This problem is one of the main reasons why MainType will have a big part of it's engine redesigned and rewritten from scratch with the next version.
Really? When will this happen?
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by León Fridsma »

We'll start with MainType 4.0 (yes, we're propably skipping 3.0) as soon as Scanahand 3.0 is released. How long it's gonna take to develop MainType 4.0 is still a big unknown because we first have to do research and make a schedule on how to proceed.
opeter
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Re: Disable active font preview?

Post by opeter »

León Fridsma wrote:We'll start with MainType 4.0 (yes, we're propably skipping 3.0) as soon as Scanahand 3.0 is released. How long it's gonna take to develop MainType 4.0 is still a big unknown because we first have to do research and make a schedule on how to proceed.
Thanks for this information.
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