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• • May 4, 2014 at 1:43 pm #68290
    Lala Lala

    Participant

    I deleted a font (actually a whole family) on my Windows 7 PC.
    But it still shows up in my Indesign font menu (complete with preview).
    How can I get rid of it?

    I had some difficulty deleting it. It’s unfortunately very common to get an error
    when trying to delete a file in windows, windows will incorrectly flag it as “in use”
    even when any program that could possible use it is close.

    The fix is either a reboot in safe mode, or or some arcane command with the Windows command prompt.
    I did the latter, and the font is gone from my windows font folder, but Indesign didn’t get the memo.

    I thought it might require deleting Adobe font cache (those .lst files)
    but I ran a search for them and found that the only .lst in Indesign’s directory,
    doesn’t make any mention of the font.

    I also found it referenced in the windows registry, and I deleted the reference (don’t try this at home)
    but still no luck.

  • May 5, 2014 at 6:30 am #68295
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    Maybe the font is in the Document Fonts folder?

  • May 6, 2014 at 12:57 pm #68324
    Lala Lala

    Participant

    Howdy David, thanks for the reply…

    I wasn’t aware of the Document Fonts folder, I googled and found info on it.
    Good thought but I don’t think that’s the issue.
    I realized that the font is also showing in my other adobe apps like photoshop (which shows no preview).

    Any other ideas? Is there a location where adobe globally stores
    copies of windows fonts, for use in all adobe programs?

  • May 7, 2014 at 8:51 am #68337
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    There are some Adobe fonts folders. Not sure where to look, especially on windows.
    More here:
    https://creativepro.com/getting-indesign-to-see-your-fonts.php

    and sometimes you can find fonts by using Reveal in Finder/Explorer inside find font:
    https://creativepro.com/indesigns-font-manager.php

    • May 7, 2014 at 1:46 pm #68343
      Lala Lala

      Participant

      No luck with those but I did finally solve it!

      It’s one of those strange windows quirks.
      Fonts may not show up (or will show up but be unusable)
      if you have no printer installed or an invalid print driver.

      That wasn’t exactly my case, but I noticed an old printer was showing
      in my list of printers, and had a warning triangle next to it.
      I removed that printer, and now the font list is correct again.

      ————

      I did try some other suggestions. It’s possible they helped.
      Before I tried the fixes below, a recently-installed free font
      disappeared from indesign, when it was working fine before.

      1. I opened windows font folder and quickly reinstalled all of them by ctrl+A (select all), right click, install.
      It will pop up errors and prompts if a non-font file got highlighted, you can just click “OK” and check
      the relevant “yes to all” box.

      2. I converted the font folder from a special system folder into a normal folder.
      The advantage to this is that no fonts or files are hidden, you can always write to it without errors,
      and it doesn’t automatically group by family if you prefer to see previews of every font
      without having to open its ‘family subfolder’.
      You can also use normal folder operations (sorting and grouping) and make it open for network users to modify.

      Anyone who wants to do this, be warned that I have no idea how to reverse it.
      But in my opinion this is worth doing. Hasn’t caused me any issues.

      To do it, open an elevated command prompt (start, type CMD in the run box, you’ll see cmd.exe appear
      at the top of the menu… ctrl+shift+right click it, choose “run as administrator”).
      Then copy this line and right click –> paste into your command prompt.

      attrib -r -s c:\Windows\Fonts

      It will lose that special “Font Folder” look but you can still get large (and even extra large) previews.

      3. I rebooted.

  • May 9, 2017 at 9:57 pm #94413
    Lala Lala

    Participant

    I wanted to add another fix I had recent font issues that drove me nuts, and now I finally understand what happens. Not just with Indesign but just about all windows font issues.

    For a font to work in indesign, you have to have the following issues straightened out.

    1. It’s correctly installed (this is where most problems are coming from).
    2. It’s not missing or incorrect in Adobe’s font list files, which float around various adobe folders on your PC.
    3. It’s not missing or incorrect in the windows font cache (which lives in C:\windowsystem32 in windows 7, and is called fntcache.dat)
    4. It’s not incorrect in your Indesign general preferences.

    Issues 2 and 3 are pretty easy fixes, and you may have already tried them. Basically, you delete fntcache.dat, and let windows rebuild it when you reboot the PC. And/or you delete the (whatever)fnt.lst files from various adobe folders, and let Indesign rebuild them.

    But if you had no success, it’s issue 1, possibly combined with issue 4, and this is poorly explained almost everywhere I’ve found, so I’m gonna try to explain it better.

    You have a few different ways of installing a font on Windows (sorry Mac users, I got no knowledge of mac font issues).
    • Right click the font file, choose install
    • Drag the font into C:\windows\fonts\
    • other ways (but nevermind, let’s move on)

    When you right click and install a font, 2 things happen.
    1. Windows copies the file to C:\windows\fonts\
    2. Windows creates an entry in the registry. The registry keeps a list of installed fonts, and your freshly-installed font gets added to this list.
    3. If the font is a Type 1 font (the ones that are made of 2 files, like something.PFM and something.PFB) then those fonts get added to a *different* list in the registry.

    I think 90% of windows font problems come from issues with this registry list.
    If a font is on the list, but not in the windows folder… you can’t use it.
    Worse, it may appear in Indesign, but give an error when you try to choose it, or just all blanks.
    If a font is in the Windows Font folder, but not on the list… you can’t use it.
    If you try to reinstall it, and it’s already on the list… you get an error like “this font is already installed”.

    It’s also possible for a font to be in the correct folder, and be in the registry list… but it still doesn’t work because the registry list points to an incorrect filename. Like the registry thinks your Scriptina font file is called “Scriptina.ttf”, but it’s actually called “Scriptina_0.otf” or something.

    On top of all that, Windows makes it difficult to easily view and delete the font files contained in C:\windows\fonts. If you go to that font folder “the usual way” you get a special folder view, where fonts get big preview icons and you see their full pretty name (e.g. “Times New Roman Bold” instead of “TimesNRB.ttf” or whatever). Unfortunately, this special view has a ton of issues.
    • The icons you see here are governed by the registry list. So if the registry list is wrong, the windows font folder will be also.
    • You can’t see the true filename, which is necessary to make that registry list work.
    • You don’t see duplicate files. It’s very possible to have something like… curlzMT.ttf, curlzMT_0.ttf, curlzMT_1.ttf, curlzMT_2.ttf, etc.
    • It displays fonts with multiple weights under one icon, which acts sort of like a windows folder… you double click it to see the fonts within the folder. But it’s not always consistent with adobe apps, e.g. you might have 20 fonts under “Meta” in the font menu, but windows shows 20 Meta icons, or worse, something weird like 10 Meta icons, with 2 fonts within each… a regular and an italic.
    • If you try to delete a font in this special font folder, you very often get an error that windows just can’t delete it. And even specialty programs like “unlocker” don’t work.

    OK, so here’s the fix that will solve almost all windows (and InDesign) font issues.

    STEP 1

    • You must straighten out that registry list first, then straighten out the windows font folder too.
    I won’t explain the whole registry and how it works, if you haven’t heard of it then be careful poking around in it, or get a more techy friend to help.

    Run regedit.
    Navigate to this “folder” (actually called a key): HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts
    *note: it’s windows NT, not just “windows”.

    After highlighting the key on the left, you’ll see a bunch of values on the right (basically each value = one font in the list).

    If you have a particular font you’re having issues with, look for it in the list, right click on it, and choose “delete”.
    Try not to delete any basic windows system fonts like arial, times new roman, and those weird language fonts like GulimChe.
    Google to find a list of system fonts for your version of windows.

    If the font is a Type 1 font, you need to go here instead: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Type 1 Installer\Type 1 Fonts\
    Same deal, look for troublesome fonts in the list on the right, right click them, choose delete.
    Note – this doesn’t delete the font file itself, just removes it from the list of installed fonts. It will still be on your computer, whether it was located in the windows font folder or somewhere else.

    Go through the list and delete fonts that you know you’ve tried to remove before, or know you don’t want. Delete fonts that give errors in your adobe applications.

    STEP 2

    • Now to clean out the windows font folder.

    Instead of viewing the windows font folder normally, you must view it in a different way. This alternate way of browsing the folder will let you see the files as usual, organize them however you want, and see the actual file names (including duplicates). This view is unaffected by that registry list mentioned above.

    To get this true view of the windows font folder, open up any folder on your PC, and at the top (where you see “address” and can manually type stuff) try copying and pasting this:
    localhost\C\Windows\fonts\

    If it works you’ll see your fonts the same way you see any other files. All those ugly duplicates with _0 and _1 in their filename will be visible. And if you delete a font, it actually works without any issue (usually). But before we delete anything – copy all the files in this folder to a new folder located somewhere else, like your desktop or wherever. We want to play it safe, because when you delete fonts in this “true view” of the font folders, I believe it’s permanent, it doesn’t move them to your recycle bin.

    Now find and remove the problem font file(s)… be aware that it might have a weird name that doesn’t make it immediately obvious. Like Palatino Bold is “palabi_0.ttf” or your Univers fonts might all start with L because they’re made by Linotype. If you see a file and are unsure what font it represents, you can just double click it and get a preview with the font’s full name.

    Now that you have a cleaned up registry list, and a cleaned up windows font folder, you can reinstall the problem fonts. I recommend you do this by making sure they’re somewhere outside of the windows font folder, then right clicking and choosing install. If all goes well, the font will be available in indesign and elsewhere, and work without any errors.

    If not, try those other fixes mentioned earlier, deleting those .lst files and the windows font cache.

    Finally, I’ve had fonts give me problems because they were somehow listed erroneously in my Indesign preferences file. I think that file keeps a full list of fonts too, if you open it in a text editor you’ll see tons of font names. If you try everything else and are about to give up, try trashing your indesign preferences. I’ll leave you to google how to do that.

  • May 22, 2017 at 10:11 am #94800
    Lala Lala

    Participant

    Edit – Every time I think I understand windows and ID font issues, I find one more snag.
    I did manage to solve it though, by erasing one more font cache I seldom see mentioned.

    Issue: I removed fonts from windows font folder, registry, and deleted windows fntcache.dat, plus all relevant .LST files from adobe folders. Font still appeared in Indesign’s font menu.

    Fix: I had to delete the file “fontmaskcache” (no extension).

    This file lives in: C:\Users\YourName\AppData\Local\Adobe\InDesign\Version X.Xn_US\Caches\

    Once I removed it and restarted indesign, the font list was completely correct, without rebooting.

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