# Linotype Font Management



## mspain77 (May 31, 2006)

so i'm trying to organize my 5,00 fonts so that I can easliy turn off what I don't need without losing fonts used in other documents.
Can someone some up the differneced between 'sets', 'smart sets', 'folders', and 'collections'?  i used the help menu and went to the site but couldn't find what i was looking for. thanks you guys.


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## Esquilinho (May 31, 2006)

Sets contain fonts

Folders contain sets of fonts

Smart sets work the same way as any smart folder in other programs (like iTunes) - you can "tell" that folder to congregate all fonts that have a five star rating, or that were designed by Linotype, or whatever, and they will be automatically displayed in that folder.

As for Collections, I still don't see the point&#8230;


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## mspain77 (May 31, 2006)

awesome! thanks man.


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## MacGizmo (Jun 8, 2006)

Collections is a feature that Apple introduced and some font management apps take advantage of. They are pretty much like Smart Sets, but unlike Smart Sets, they actually display in your font menu of applications that can take advantage of OSX's Collections feature. When you click the font menu in your app you will see a folder(s) at the top of the list of your Collections followed by the normal font list.

They're useful if say you want to group your fonts by client, type of font (script, dingbat, etc.).


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## fryke (Jun 8, 2006)

5 fonts, though, is not that much to handle.


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## bbloke (Jun 8, 2006)

fryke said:
			
		

> 5 fonts, though, is not that much to handle.


I'm not sure everyone here will get that "Continental" reference (i.e. "," vs "." for decimal places etc.)...


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## fryke (Jun 8, 2006)

Hm. I personally use "." for decimal places. But 5,00 _can't_ mean 500, can it?  (Of course I'm aware that he wanted to say 5'000 or 5,000 or 5000, but I just couldn't resist...)


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## bbloke (Jun 8, 2006)

fryke said:
			
		

> Hm. I personally use "." for decimal places.


Ah, good man; using the proper notation.   


			
				fryke said:
			
		

> But 5,00 _can't_ mean 500, can it?  (Of course I'm aware that he wanted to say 5'000 or 5,000 or 5000, but I just couldn't resist...)


Yeah, I realized this at the time, but knew mspain77 meant 5,000 as I'd seen that figure mentioned in a different post.


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## CaptainQuark (Jun 8, 2006)

fryke said:
			
		

> Hm. I personally use "." for decimal places. But 5,00 _can't_ mean 500, can it?  (Of course I'm aware that he wanted to say 5'000 or 5,000 or 5000, but I just couldn't resist...)


and just HOW many times can you split the average human hair?


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## Natobasso (Jun 9, 2006)

Here's what I do: Just place all the fonts you use in your hard drive, first directory (not Library/Fonts). Import all those fonts into FontExplorer. Create a folder in which I store any fonts I want to activate regularly and FE auto-activates the rest. Simple and sweet.

I'm a convert from Suitcase now...


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## RGrphc2 (Jun 9, 2006)

Natobasso said:
			
		

> I'm a convert from Suitcase now...



yea, same here, could never configure suitcase to my liking this is a lot better and easier to use.


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## MacGizmo (Jun 9, 2006)

The one thing that Suitcase Fusion has over other font managers is the ability to activate/de-activate a single font in a typeface. So I can turn on Helvetica Condensed Bold Oblique without turning on all the Helvetica Condensed fonts. This is especially useful when you have a font conflict but really need to use one particular typeface.


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## Esquilinho (Jun 10, 2006)

Waw! That collections thing seem cool! Gonna try it as soon as I get back to work! 

Another point in favour to convince my company to ditch Suitcase and adopt Font Explorer! 

I'm a convert already!


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## mspain77 (Jun 12, 2006)

yeah, sorry guys.  sometimes I type faster than my brain can read the signals that my eyes are telling it, i.e. the typo.  I meant 5,000.  I'll be more careful. Yeah, I usually won't activate a font management program unless I'm dealing with at least 13 fontsthen it's gets complicated.


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## Natobasso (Jun 12, 2006)

MacGizmo said:
			
		

> The one thing that Suitcase Fusion has over other font managers is the ability to activate/de-activate a single font in a typeface. So I can turn on Helvetica Condensed Bold Oblique without turning on all the Helvetica Condensed fonts. This is especially useful when you have a font conflict but really need to use one particular typeface.



I have heard Suitcase Fusion can be a very buggy program and doesn't function well in Tiger...


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## MacGizmo (Jun 13, 2006)

<p>





			
				Natobasso said:
			
		

> I have heard Suitcase Fusion can be a very buggy program and doesn't function well in Tiger...


That's overly generalized. I run it at home and at the office with no problems at all. But, I run a very clean system and I'm quite knowledgable about the OS and its quirks. I could also just be "lucky" in that nothing is conflicting with Fusion and I don't have any corrupt fonts.

On the other hand, I ran FE X on my home computer with no problems, but could not get it to work worth a darn for more than 10 minutes at the office - same machine, same versions of software, same fonts.

I have no love for Suitcase. But font managers are just one of those things that everyone will never agree on, and to make it worse, they never seem to work the same for people.


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## Natobasso (Jun 13, 2006)

MacGizmo said:
			
		

> <p>
> That's overly generalized.



Here's some specifics:

A client had upgraded to Tiger and CS2 suite and then couldn't use Fusion at all. Crashed all his apps whenever he tried to activate it. Seems like a specific issue to me, apologies for not disclosing those earlier.

I have had great success with Linotype Font Explorer, but I think the more important thing to remember is where you store your fonts. Make sure they are all together, not on an external drive or server and not in System/Fonts.

And no matter how hard we try, no two computers are ever perfectly the same (regarding having all the same software installed, etc.)


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## Esquilinho (Jun 14, 2006)

MacGizmo said:
			
		

> The one thing that Suitcase Fusion has over other font managers is the ability to activate/de-activate a single font in a typeface. So I can turn on Helvetica Condensed Bold Oblique without turning on all the Helvetica Condensed fonts. This is especially useful when you have a font conflict but really need to use one particular typeface.




You can do the same with FE X


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## Esquilinho (Jun 14, 2006)

MacGizmo said:
			
		

> Collections is a feature that Apple introduced and some font management apps take advantage of. They are pretty much like Smart Sets, but unlike Smart Sets, they actually display in your font menu of applications that can take advantage of OSX's Collections feature. When you click the font menu in your app you will see a folder(s) at the top of the list of your Collections followed by the normal font list.
> 
> They're useful if say you want to group your fonts by client, type of font (script, dingbat, etc.).



Damn, only works for cocoa apps so no use for InDesign


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