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by Insider Software
800-700-6348
Price: (included in review)
Review by Gary Coyne
From the early days of the Mac, there have always been more fonts available than even Apple ever anticipated. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but "administering" to all these fonts has always been a challenge. A variety of programs have been designed to help the user select which fonts were installed at any one time (Suitcase (by Extensis, http://www.extensis.com/index.html), MasterJuggler Pro (by Alsoft, http://www.alsoft.com), ATM Deluxe (by Adobe, www. adobe.com), and Font Reserve (by DiamondSoft, http://www.fontreserve.com) come to mind), but from this list, only Font Reserve can deal with the same issues as FontAgent: that of the care-and-maintenance of the fonts on your hard drive. (Perhaps because Font Reserve does perform many of the same tasks as FontAgent, Font Reserve is conspicuously absent from the FontAgent manual.)
What FontAgent does is review the fonts on your hard drive, or specific folders you select, and check the fonts contained therein for:
- duplicated fonts (TrueType and/or Type 1)
- fonts that you have the PostScript font for and not the bitmapped font (of Type 1), or visa versa (aka orphaned fonts)
- damaged fonts
- bitmapped fonts over 12 points (to improve speed and accuracy when ATM is rendering larger sizes of fonts)
FontAgent does not deal with installing fonts in your system, so you will still need one of the above programs for selecting which fonts are active on your computer (as opposed to Font Reserve which does both).
Although the potential for damaged fonts can show up with any number of fonts you have, by the time you've collected over a hundred fonts or more, it becomes all to easy to inadvertently have collected duplicate fonts and/or a few orphaned Type 1 fonts. FontAgent takes care of all this and it does it very well.
Despite the excellent job that FontAgent does with these issues, the interface is simple enough to be a bit tricky. While I cannot fault the program's range of options, too many of these options are too easy to pass up and some of these are options you don't want to miss.
To the program's credit, there is a Help window on every screen (see bottom left of the Basic FontAgent Screen (1)), and on each of these Help windows, there is a button that opens the pdf manual (You must have Adobe Acrobat or the free Acrobat Reader to use the pdf document.) Once configured to the way you want FontAgent to run, you can save your settings. Because you are working with something that is vital with your computer, your fonts, the manual should be completely read prior to using the program. I'd also take to heart their suggestion that one should make a copy of any font folder prior to running that folder through FontAgent.
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| (1) Basic FontAgent Screen |
An example of where the program can be potentially dangerous can be demonstrated if you maintain your fonts in a very formal organization on your hard drive. Let's say you have your fonts separated by Type 1, TrueType, foundry, freeware and purchased fonts, etc. If you choose the option of "Optimize fonts & place in new folder" (as seen in the previous screen shot), and forget to set how it will end up in that new folder (see
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| (2) Font Receiving Folder |
One area of interface "show-off" is after the program has reviewed all the fonts and is presenting to the user what the program has found. Notice above I isolated the 4 main functions of what the program is looking for. Surprisingly, the program tediously takes 7 screens to present its results (see Results (3)). Later, you will also get a screen stating that there are no PostScript fonts without bitmapped fonts. Notice that the message on the "OK" button says "Cool." If the there were PostScript fonts without bitmapped fonts, the "OK" button would say "Fix." In reality, the program can't fix this (create the bitmapped font) but instead moves the orphan font into a new folder of all the PostScript fonts without bitmapped fonts. Thus, the "OK" button should say
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| (3) Results |
Finally for this review is my problem with Insider's payment plan for FontAgent; they have three:
- Limited Edition can work with less than 250 fonts $29.95
- Standard Edition can work with unlimited fonts $69.95
- Network Edition can work with unlimited fonts for 10 computers $169.95
While these numbers by themselves are not unreasonable, bear in mind that the purchase of the Limited or Standard Edition is for one computer only. That is, if you own a PowerBook and a desktop machine, you will have to purchase two copies of the program. The registration process requires a code that comes from one specific computer. Trying to install onto a second computer will not work--even Microsoft hasn't gone that far. Admittedly, one can copy the fonts from one machine, place them on the machine with the program, process the fonts, and then return/replace them on the original machine. Regardless, it is an uncommon and overly restrictive policy. I do not know how Insider Software deals with a user who has purchased a new computer.
Despite my complaints, as long as you follow the guidelines presented in the manual FontAgent does what it sets out to do and does it very well. FontAgent cannot manage which fonts show up in your OS, and you will need one of the other font management tools mentioned above to do that. And, Font Reserve has many duplicate abilities (they overlap in abilities) that are not incompatible. Thus, you can take advantage of both their strengths.
Now, if we can just do something about the programs that automatically dump a bunch of fonts into your System Fonts folder with no option to place them anywhere else...
Applelinks Rating
___________ Gary Coyne has been a scientific glassblower for over 30 years. He's been using Macs since 1985 (his first was a fat Mac) and has been writing reviews of Mac software and hardware since 1995.
Tags: Reviews ď Graphics/Design ď
