Times/Helvetica mishmash

[Bill Tuthill]

I successfully installed FrameMaker 7.2 on a SPARC Solaris server
and am messing around with fonts.

What is the best solution for Times/Helvetica (TimesNew/Ariel)
cross-platform compatibility?

A. Install Type-1 Times/Helvetica fonts on both Windows and Unix; or

B. Copy Microsoft-supplied TrueType TimesNew/Ariel fonts from Windows
to the Unix system, and modify fondir/fontlist accordingly?

I tried solution B first, although I might not have modified fontlist
correctly. Now I am getting a "formatted with different font metrics"
alert on every file open. TIA.

[Tim Murray]

Post by Bill Tuthill
I successfully installed FrameMaker 7.2 on a SPARC Solaris server
and am messing around with fonts.
What is the best solution for Times/Helvetica (TimesNew/Ariel)
cross-platform compatibility?
A. Install Type-1 Times/Helvetica fonts on both Windows and Unix; or
B. Copy Microsoft-supplied TrueType TimesNew/Ariel fonts from Windows
to the Unix system, and modify fondir/fontlist accordingly?
I tried solution B first, although I might not have modified fontlist
correctly. Now I am getting a "formatted with different font metrics"
alert on every file open. TIA.

I don't know how Solaris server + Frame knows about font metrics, or knows
how they are different. But generally, it is the font name *and* font vendor
that are key. For example, Adobe's Helvetica should give a similar result on
all platforms.

That said, I try to use Type 1 whenever I can. Any time I have had any issue
with fonts, if I unload the TrueTypes, my problems disappear. I even have
customers who publish best practices that specify no TrueTypes -- only Type 1
or Type 1-wrapped OpenTypes are allowed.

[Bill Tuthill]

Post by Tim Murray

Post by Bill Tuthill
A. Install Type-1 Times/Helvetica fonts on both Windows and Unix; or
B. Copy Microsoft-supplied TrueType TimesNew/Ariel fonts from Windows
to the Unix system, and modify fontdir/fontlist accordingly?

I don't know how Solaris server + Frame knows about font metrics, or knows
how they are different. But generally, it is the font name *and* font vendor
that are key. For example, Adobe's Helvetica should give a similar result on
all platforms.
That said, I try to use Type 1 whenever I can. Any time I have had any issue
with fonts, if I unload the TrueTypes, my problems disappear. I even have
customers who publish best practices that specify no TrueTypes -- only
Type 1 or Type 1-wrapped OpenTypes are allowed.

That's excellent advice -- use Type1 fonts if possible. Quality is better
in most cases.

However upon asking this question at an Adobe support forum, the answer
I got was "install as many fonts as possible to avoid error messages"
(or something similar to that). That seems to work fairly well, and the
"using different font metrics" hurdle only occurs once.

Most of these bogus font messages are coming from leftover tempate dreck
and it's easier to hide them than to fix them.

The fontdir/fontlist processing in Unix FrameMaker is broken in 7.2
and has been broken for several releases. So don't believe everything
you read in $FMHOME/fminit/usenglish/OnlineManuals/Unix_Fonts.pdf !