Font Advice

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GeorgeBell
Sr. Propeller Head
Posts: 114
Joined: Thu Nov 22, 2012 3:27 am

Font Advice

Post by GeorgeBell »

I'd very much appreciate some help and advice from anyone who has developed Help systems for both Windows and Mac, and faced problems with fonts.

As a bit of background, the main application is supplied internationally and handles around 140 different languages, although the primary help is in English. We stumbled into our first problem not long after Windows 10 was released. However, it was not long before we realised that it was the newer versions of Microsoft Office which were the cause. And in fact, it was only then a problem if the Office was NOT an upgrade from an older version.

Because of needing to use a wide variety of Unicode Glyphs, we had always been using "Arial Unicode MS" which contains over 50,000 glyphs. But on a new PC, with a newer, virgin MS Office installed, this font is no longer supplied. The result was pretty horrific, but after a crash course in Font Families, and as a fall back, we were able to add plain Arial.

We are now in the final stages of a Mac version of the same software, and fonts are yet again causing headaches. What we ideally would like for the main text is a font which is visually like Arial or Arial Unicode MS, but available on both Windows and Mac. Moreover, it needs to contain as wide a variety of Unicode glyphs as Arial Unicode MS. Is there such a font?
RamonS
Senior Propellus Maximus
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Joined: Thu Feb 02, 2006 9:29 am
Location: The Electric City

Re: Font Advice

Post by RamonS »

I am by no means a font expert, but look into embedding the font you need assuming it is allowed to be redistributed. I know that this works for web help, you did not specify the output format. See http://www.w3schools.com/css/css3_fonts.asp
okonvick
Propeller Head
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Joined: Mon Jan 12, 2015 6:19 am

Re: Font Advice

Post by okonvick »

George, were you able to resolve this somehow? I'm also interested in learning how to do this.
trent the thief
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Location: Off in the dark....

Re: Font Advice

Post by trent the thief »

RamonS wrote:I am by no means a font expert, but look into embedding the font you need assuming it is allowed to be redistributed. I know that this works for web help, you did not specify the output format. See http://www.w3schools.com/css/css3_fonts.asp
Hi Ramon, if a person subscribes to Adobe Typekit, shouldn't they be able to sync the desired fonts to their desktop, specify them in Flare, and then add the JavaScript typescript calls to the topic template?

(<script type="text/javascript" src="https://use.typekit.net/xxxxxx.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">try{Typekit.load({ async: true });}catch(e){}</script>)
Trent.

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umm...
I meant MAD Certified.

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:flare: Are you on Flare's Slack channels? PM me for an invitation! :flare:
RamonS
Senior Propellus Maximus
Posts: 4293
Joined: Thu Feb 02, 2006 9:29 am
Location: The Electric City

Re: Font Advice

Post by RamonS »

I wish I knew. I know that some companies dictate which font to use, but I tend to go with something really simple like Arial and then specify a sans serif font class in case Arial is not found. Might look boring and old school, but is a great way to stay out of font trouble.
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