Assistance needed: Font Cache, Font Managers, etc.

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JCH2

Assistance needed: Font Cache, Font Managers, etc.

Post by JCH2 »

Well, I did a major screw up... perhaps. I maintain a library of about 32,000 font files on a portable drive. Using "Font Manager," I attempted to get (just) a listing of all of those fonts, as both Font Matrix and the old FontyPython were not cutting it. Instead, it appears that I "installed" all of those fonts. Took Font Manager twenty minutes to reload.

I would like to know where to look to remove any cache of information that Font Manager is using so it will start from scratch. At a guess (only), the fonts themselves were not physically moved to the main drive, but perhaps that needs to be checked as well. All help would be appreciated; though I have worked on computers for 30+ years, I've only been fulltime on Linux (LM17-64) for about a month (and relieved to do so), so please be explicit.

Secondary topic....

In all of those years (most in Windows, the last 5+ in OSX), I used such font managers as Fusion, Font Expert, etc. I know that level of app does not exist in the Linux world, but I am open to suggestions for anything that is more up to date than FontyPython and (much) better at comparative display than Font Matrix (really disliked that one).

Thanks folks
Last edited by LockBot on Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
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DrHu

Re: Assistance needed: Font Cache, Font Managers, etc.

Post by DrHu »

If you check, there might be GUI based font managers for Linux OS
http://linux.softpedia.com/get/Desktop- ... 0798.shtml
http://archive09.linux.com/feature/133559
http://alicious.com/best-font-managers-for-linux/
--or others.
  • However, even if there aren't any current font manager programs, is it really needed
    --people tended to install way too many fonts anyway, an outcome of some graphics programs such as Corel Draw and so on,
    --or the idea that having a ginormous font choice helped with design issues.
http://xpt.sourceforge.net/techdocs/nix ... 01s02.html
  • Fontconfig should rebuild the list of fonts while it's running. If you need to force this, run: fc-cache
https://wiki.kubuntu.org/Fonts
  • Manually
    There are various locations in GNU/Linux in which fonts can be kept. These locations are defined in /etc/fonts/fonts.conf; standard ones include /usr/share/fonts, /usr/local/share/fonts, and /home/<username>/.fonts (where <username> is your user name).
--Ubuntu help ref: fonts.
JCH2

Re: Assistance needed: Font Cache, Font Managers, etc.

Post by JCH2 »

Thanks, DrHu. I will look in those locations and see what I can find. Everytime I now open an application that must read the font cache, it hangs; so I definitely messed up somewhere. And I will look around for a real font manager, but I do not hold out much hope.
However, even if there aren't any current font manager programs, is it really needed
--people tended to install way too many fonts anyway, an outcome of some graphics programs such as Corel Draw and so on,
--or the idea that having a ginormous font choice helped with design issues.
[/list]
I know what you mean... and that is not what a real font "manager" does... because I have used such for decades.

A font manager of any worth "activates" fonts on the fly from a library (not installed fonts) as necessary for the OS and / or applications. With Extensis, the fonts are cataloged for reference and a small daemon runs in memory. When a file is opened which needs specfic fonts, a real font manager's daemon intercepts the call by the application for those fonts, activates them for use (which may or not mean temporarily installing just those fonts) and provides access on the fly. It is possible to have a font archive of 32k fonts and have no more than a couple dozen installed at any time.

I do a lot of (e)publishing and graphics work aside from the novels I write under contract for a new york publisher. This is all why I am fairly certain no such program exists in the Linux world (very sad). And what are called a font managers in the Linux world have so far been a big disappointment as even just font "browsers." It seems those who coded them are operating under the same misconceptions of what font manager should really do.

Thanks again for the help... and now to figure how to undo my mess, if possible, from a font "browser" that did something other than what I thought it would.

PS. "Font Manager" the application was the culprit in this case. I merely wanted to browser my font archive recursively... and I'm guessing it shoved every font I own into the system. Yikes!
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