Font Book vs. "Those Professional Font Managers"

Here's an example of something that is trivial to do in Apple's Font Book and
I'm curious as to how easily the same thing is accomplished in one of the
"professional" font managers such as Font Explorer or Suitcase Fusion.

When Adobe's Creative Suite 2 is installed a folder is created in
Library/Application Support/Fonts that contains some 180 .otf files each of
which contains a single face within a font family. Thus a given font family
can be represented by one or more .otf files.

What is helpful (at least to me) is to place all of the .otf files for a
given family inside an appropriately named folder. In the case of Creative
Suite 2 this would result in 41 folders.

In the case of Font Book this clustering can be accomplished by....

a) Using the "New Library" command to create a, yes, new library

b) Dragging the Fonts folder onto the empty list of fonts listed for the just
created library

c) Select all of the font families now shown in the new library

d) Select the "Export Fonts..." command and supply the destination in the
dialog box that appeaars

...... and the result is a folder containing a collection of folders, one such
folder for each of the font families, the family folder automatically being
given as its name the family name of the included .otf files that are members
of that family. As an example, one of the resulting folders is named Adobe
Caslon Pro and it contains six .otf files, ACaslonPro-Bold.otf,
ACaslonPro-BoldItalic.otf, and so on.

To be able to quickly cluster fonts in this manner is one of the underplayed
but powerful features of Font Book.



--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft@mac.com

In article <0001HW.C155B2CB00030E07B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:

> Here's an example of something that is trivial to do in Apple's Font Book and
> I'm curious as to how easily the same thing is accomplished in one of the
> "professional" font managers such as Font Explorer or Suitcase Fusion.
>
> When Adobe's Creative Suite 2 is installed a folder is created in
> Library/Application Support/Fonts that contains some 180 .otf files each of
> which contains a single face within a font family. Thus a given font family
> can be represented by one or more .otf files.
>
> What is helpful (at least to me) is to place all of the .otf files for a
> given family inside an appropriately named folder. In the case of Creative
> Suite 2 this would result in 41 folders.
>
> In the case of Font Book this clustering can be accomplished by....
>
> a) Using the "New Library" command to create a, yes, new library
>
> b) Dragging the Fonts folder onto the empty list of fonts listed for the just
> created library
>
> c) Select all of the font families now shown in the new library
>
> d) Select the "Export Fonts..." command and supply the destination in the
> dialog box that appeaars
>
> ..... and the result is a folder containing a collection of folders, one such
> folder for each of the font families, the family folder automatically being
> given as its name the family name of the included .otf files that are members
> of that family. As an example, one of the resulting folders is named Adobe
> Caslon Pro and it contains six .otf files, ACaslonPro-Bold.otf,
> ACaslonPro-BoldItalic.otf, and so on.
>
> To be able to quickly cluster fonts in this manner is one of the underplayed
> but powerful features of Font Book.

In LinoType's Font Explorer, just check the "Group Font Families"
checkbox when you create the Library.

--
Spenser

On Fri, 13 Oct 2006 22:05:31 -0500, sbt wrote
(in article <131020062005317409%dogbreath@chaseabone.com.invali d>):

[responding to my description of how to cluster fonts into appropriate
folders]

> In LinoType's Font Explorer, just check the "Group Font Families" checkbox
> when you create the Library.

Could you elaborate a bit. Does the action you describe create Finder folders
or does it just create what in Font Book parlance is a "collection".

--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft@mac.com

On Fri, 13 Oct 2006 22:24:31 -0500, TaliesinSoft wrote (in article
<0001HW.C155C29F00006410B019F94F@news.supernews.com >):

> On Fri, 13 Oct 2006 22:05:31 -0500, sbt wrote (in article
> <131020062005317409%dogbreath@chaseabone.com.invali d>):
>
> [responding to my description of how to cluster fonts into appropriate
> folders]
>
>> In LinoType's Font Explorer, just check the "Group Font Families"
>> checkbox when you create the Library.
>
> Could you elaborate a bit. Does the action you describe create Finder
> folders or does it just create what in Font Book parlance is a
> "collection".

I just did a bit of "exploring" by downloading and installing Linotype Font
Explorer, and compared the "export" of fonts by selecting the same families
in each of Font Book and Font Explorer and then exporting them to the
desktop.

With Font Book the result was a folder containing a sub-folder for each
family, appropriately named with the family name, and within the sub-folder
all of the individual files comprising that family.

With Font Explorer the result was a folder containing only the individual
files comprising all of the families that were exported.

--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft@mac.com

In article <0001HW.C155B2CB00030E07B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:

> Here's an example of something that is trivial to do in Apple's Font Book and
> I'm curious as to how easily the same thing is accomplished in one of the
> "professional" font managers such as Font Explorer or Suitcase Fusion.
>
> When Adobe's Creative Suite 2 is installed a folder is created in
> Library/Application Support/Fonts that contains some 180 .otf files each of
> which contains a single face within a font family. Thus a given font family
> can be represented by one or more .otf files.
>
> What is helpful (at least to me) is to place all of the .otf files for a
> given family inside an appropriately named folder. In the case of Creative
> Suite 2 this would result in 41 folders.
>
> In the case of Font Book this clustering can be accomplished by....
>
> a) Using the "New Library" command to create a, yes, new library
>
> b) Dragging the Fonts folder onto the empty list of fonts listed for the just
> created library
>
> c) Select all of the font families now shown in the new library
>
> d) Select the "Export Fonts..." command and supply the destination in the
> dialog box that appeaars
>
> ..... and the result is a folder containing a collection of folders, one such
> folder for each of the font families, the family folder automatically being
> given as its name the family name of the included .otf files that are members
> of that family. As an example, one of the resulting folders is named Adobe
> Caslon Pro and it contains six .otf files, ACaslonPro-Bold.otf,
> ACaslonPro-BoldItalic.otf, and so on.
>
> To be able to quickly cluster fonts in this manner is one of the underplayed
> but powerful features of Font Book.

In Suitcase or Linotype FontExplorer:

Drag the folder containing the fonts into the app's window.

That's it.

Everything is grouped, sorted, previewed, etc.

Have a nice weekend.

In article <0001HW.C155B2CB00030E07B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:

> To be able to quickly cluster fonts in this manner is one of the underplayed
> but powerful features of Font Book.

That's what I thought at first, and I played with that for a while at
first before discovering my stupid WP wouldn't open a folder, just the
whole clunky list.

It's AppleWorks 6 and really irritating, but until I buy a new printer
and scanner(and I'm very happy with what I have), I have to use the G4
for both of them, so I need a WP the still-OS 9+ G4(which is networked
with the MacBook Pro) can open, and I have AW on both because it has
both versions.

Anyone know a way to teach AW to see the folders in Font Book? TextEdit
can, but the G4 doesn't like it, besides which, it's even less
satisfying than AW otherwise.

--
Mary Loomer Oliver (aka Erilar),
philologist, biblioholic medievalist

http://www.airstreamcomm.net/~erilarlo

On Sat, 14 Oct 2006 00:29:49 -0500, Dave Balderstone wrote (in article
<131020062329494360%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.c a>):

> In article <0001HW.C155B2CB00030E07B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
> TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:
>
>> Here's an example of something that is trivial to do in Apple's Font Book
>> and I'm curious as to how easily the same thing is accomplished in one of
>> the "professional" font managers such as Font Explorer or Suitcase Fusion.
>>
>> When Adobe's Creative Suite 2 is installed a folder is created in
>> Library/Application Support/Fonts that contains some 180 .otf files each
>> of which contains a single face within a font family. Thus a given font
>> family can be represented by one or more .otf files.
>>
>> What is helpful (at least to me) is to place all of the .otf files for a
>> given family inside an appropriately named folder. In the case of
>> Creative Suite 2 this would result in 41 folders.
>>
>> In the case of Font Book this clustering can be accomplished by....
>>
>> a) Using the "New Library" command to create a, yes, new library
>>
>> b) Dragging the Fonts folder onto the empty list of fonts listed for the
>> just created library
>>
>> c) Select all of the font families now shown in the new library
>>
>> d) Select the "Export Fonts..." command and supply the destination in the
>> dialog box that appeaars
>>
>> ..... and the result is a folder containing a collection of folders, one
>> such folder for each of the font families, the family folder
>> automatically being given as its name the family name of the included
>> .otf files that are members of that family. As an example, one of the
>> resulting folders is named Adobe Caslon Pro and it contains six .otf
>> files, ACaslonPro-Bold.otf, ACaslonPro-BoldItalic.otf, and so on.
>>
>> To be able to quickly cluster fonts in this manner is one of the
>> underplayed but powerful features of Font Book.
>
> In Suitcase or Linotype FontExplorer:
>
> Drag the folder containing the fonts into the app's window.
>
> That's it.
>
> Everything is grouped, sorted, previewed, etc.
>
> Have a nice weekend.

But unfortunately you've presented a solution to a problem other than the one
I described. What I wanted to do is to select, while in the font manager, an
arbitrary number of fonts and have them exported so that the result is a
folder on the desktop which contains as many folders as there were font
families in the selection and where each such family folder contains all of
the constituent fonts in that family that were included in the selection.

And, yes, I am indeed having a grand weekend and hope the same is happening
for you!

--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft@mac.com

In article <0001HW.C156A38000020BA7B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:

> But unfortunately you've presented a solution to a problem other than the one
> I described.

You're right, I misunderstood that you want fonts actually moved in the
Finder.

In Linotype Font Explorer:

Select the fonts you want to organize.

Choose "Export" from the "Font" menu.

Select a destination folder.

In Suitcase X11 this is not possible, as far as I can determine.

I don't have Suitcase Fusion, so don't know that one but you could
download the demo and check.

On Sat, 14 Oct 2006 14:53:05 -0500, Dave Balderstone wrote (in article
<141020061353055799%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.c a>):

> In article <0001HW.C156A38000020BA7B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
> TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:
>
>> But unfortunately you've presented a solution to a problem other than the
>> one I described.
>
> You're right, I misunderstood that you want fonts actually moved in the
> Finder.
>
> In Linotype Font Explorer:
>
> Select the fonts you want to organize.
>
> Choose "Export" from the "Font" menu.
>
> Select a destination folder.
>
> In Suitcase X11 this is not possible, as far as I can determine.
>
> I don't have Suitcase Fusion, so don't know that one but you could
> download the demo and check.

Closer, but still no cigar!

The result I am seeking from a font export, the result I obtain with Font
Book, is to have a folder which contains one or more folders each of which
contains all the exported font files of a common font family, and each of
which is given a name appropriate to the contained files.

For example, a contained folder could have the name "Adobe Caslon Pro" and
the files within could be "ACaslonPro-Bold.otf" and
"ACaslonPro-BoldItalic.otf". This is the form of the result obtained when
fonts are exported via Font Book. In the case of Linotype Font Explorer there
would only be the font files themselves and not the containing appropriately
named folder.









--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft@mac.com

In article <0001HW.C156F952000796F5B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:

> Closer, but still no cigar!
>
> The result I am seeking from a font export, the result I obtain with Font
> Book, is to have a folder which contains one or more folders each of which
> contains all the exported font files of a common font family, and each of
> which is given a name appropriate to the contained files.
>
> For example, a contained folder could have the name "Adobe Caslon Pro" and
> the files within could be "ACaslonPro-Bold.otf" and
> "ACaslonPro-BoldItalic.otf". This is the form of the result obtained when
> fonts are exported via Font Book. In the case of Linotype Font Explorer there
> would only be the font files themselves and not the containing appropriately
> named folder.

If you already know what the other font management programs do in this
regard, why are you asking what they do in this regard?

Have fun with FontBook. I can't imagine needing the utility you seem to
need more than once every couple or five years (as part of a
reorganization of a badly structured font collection, but if it's the
defining feature of a font manager for you, then you've obviously found
what you're looking for.

On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 00:04:19 -0500, Dave Balderstone wrote (in article
<141020062304190238%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.c a>):

> In article <0001HW.C156F952000796F5B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
> TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:
>
>> Closer, but still no cigar!
>>
>> The result I am seeking from a font export, the result I obtain with Font
>> Book, is to have a folder which contains one or more folders each of
>> which contains all the exported font files of a common font family, and
>> each of which is given a name appropriate to the contained files.
>>
>> For example, a contained folder could have the name "Adobe Caslon Pro"
>> and the files within could be "ACaslonPro-Bold.otf" and
>> "ACaslonPro-BoldItalic.otf". This is the form of the result obtained when
>> fonts are exported via Font Book. In the case of Linotype Font Explorer
>> there would only be the font files themselves and not the containing
>> appropriately named folder.
>
> If you already know what the other font management programs do in this
> regard, why are you asking what they do in this regard?

I learned what Linotype Font Explorer did in this regard yesterday when I
downloaded and installed it in order to check out a response made by "sbt" to
my original posting. Prior to that I had no idea how it would behave in
regards to exporting fonts.

> Have fun with FontBook. I can't imagine needing the utility you seem to
> need more than once every couple or five years (as part of a
> reorganization of a badly structured font collection, but if it's the
> defining feature of a font manager for you, then you've obviously found
> what you're looking for.

As for the clustering of fonts via Font Book, that is a technique of
organization strongly recommended by Sharon Zardetto Aker in her book Mac OS
X Fonts, Industrial-Strength Techniques. (Sharon is a quite successful
author, having written almost a thousand articles for Macintosh magazines and
having written more than twenty computer books.) Using the Font Book export
function has allowed me to create a very rational organization of my own font
collection. And, yes, I'll admit to being somewhat of a neatnik when it comes
to how things on my computers are organized. And, yes, I do have fun using
Font Book.

--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft@mac.com

In article <0001HW.C15738A7000B4422B019F94F@news.supernews.com >,
TaliesinSoft <taliesinsoft@mac.com> wrote:

> As for the clustering of fonts via Font Book, that is a technique of
> organization strongly recommended by Sharon Zardetto Aker in her book Mac OS
> X Fonts, Industrial-Strength Techniques. (Sharon is a quite successful
> author, having written almost a thousand articles for Macintosh magazines and
> having written more than twenty computer books.) Using the Font Book export
> function has allowed me to create a very rational organization of my own font
> collection. And, yes, I'll admit to being somewhat of a neatnik when it comes
> to how things on my computers are organized. And, yes, I do have fun using
> Font Book.

One of the things a font manager should do is organize fonts within its
own context, without regard for how the actual font files are organized
on the hard drive.

On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 10:00:06 -0500, Dave Balderstone wrote (in article
<151020060900065003%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.c a>):

> One of the things a font manager should do is organize fonts within its
> own context, without regard for how the actual font files are organized on
> the hard drive.

I agree and it appears to be so with both Font Book and Linotype Font
Explorer.

At this time all of my fonts are either in /System/Library/Fonts or
Library/Fonts. Those that are in Library/Fonts are organized into a further
hierarchy of folders, the first level identifying the supplier of the font,
e.g. Apple, Microsoft, Adobe, etc. and the second level identifying the font
family, e.g. Brioso Pro, Garamond Premier Pro, etc.

In my case the only difference in the font lists displayed by Linotype Font
Explorer and Font Book is that the former shows the system fonts prefixed
with a period (the ones for use only be Mac OS X itself) and the latter does
not.

--
James Leo Ryan ..... Austin, Texas ..... taliesinsoft@mac.com