Version 2.0, November 18, 1997
Price: Free!

Virtue is my improvement of Apple Computer's "Charcoal" font appearing in Mac OS 8.

About Virtue

There is a lot of controversy about this font, and honestly, I think that most of it is unjustified. Basically, a lot of people did not want this font to appear in the Mac OS 8. I think that this feeling is based on a "reverse-engineered" font developed by Greg Landweber for his Aaron extension and Kaleidoscope control panel. Greg built his font from looking at various screenshots and did a good job at making a very complete font. However, the spacing information and special characters characters seemed a little off to me. It seems that Apple couldn't decide whether Charcoal should have two pixels between the letters or just one. This leads to a cramped appearance on screen.

So here's what I did: basically, I took his work and tried to space it how I would if I was making Apple's next font. I studied the "Chicago" system font and and used it as a template for my font. After about 2 hours of tinkering, I had a bitmap font that looked really good as a replacement font for Kaleidoscope. About a week later, after tinkering some more, I made even more improvements. Now with the release of Mac OS 8, I have expanded Virtue's character set and created an Appearance Extension patch that allows Mac OS 8 users to select Virtue in the Appearance Control Panel.

Installation Instructions

(note: this will only work if you have Mac OS 8.0. Also, you do not have to apply the patch again if you have already done so in a previous version of Virtue.)

  1. Drag the "Virtue" icon to the System Folder (the Finder will put it where it belongs).
  2. Double click on the "Appearance Virtue patch" and follow the instructions on screen for installing the patch.
  3. Restart your computer. (This will allow the patched Appearance Extension to load.)
  4. Select "Appearance" from the "Control Panels" folder in the Apple menu.
  5. Press the "Options" button and change the System Font to "Virtue" in the pop-up menu under Appearances.
  6. Restart your computer. (Yeah, this is kinda weird, but Apple decided that you'll have to restart your computer if you want to change the System Font.)

If you are upgrading from a previous version of Virtue, follow these instructions:

  1. Select "Appearance" from the "Control Panels" folder in the Apple menu.
  2. Press the "Options" button and change the System Font to "Chicago" in the pop-up menu under Appearances.
  3. Restart your computer.
  4. Open the "Fonts" folder in the System folder. Drag the old "Virtue" font suitcase to the trash can.
  5. Drag the "Virtue" icon to the System Folder (the Finder will put it where it belongs).
  6. Select "Appearance" from the "Control Panels" folder in the Apple menu.
  7. Press the "Options" button and change the System Font to "Virtue" in the pop-up menu under Appearances.
  8. Restart your computer. (Yeah, this is kinda weird, but Apple decided that you'll have to restart your computer if you want to change the System Font.)

Feel free to tell me how you feel about this font, good or bad. If you have some specific criticisms, I'd love to hear them, so I can improve Virtue. My email address is <wamozart@teleport.com> Also check my web page for updates at: <http://www.teleport.com/~wamozart/fonts.html>

Freeware Notice

You don't need to pay a cent for this font. In fact, I will refuse to take any money for it at all. Please, I'm begging you, NO MONEY!!!!! If you want to spend some money, take a look at some of my other fonts previewed here and buy them from my website. I do retain all rights to this font, so don't even think about trying to sell it. I mean really, how tacky could you get.

Related Links

If you like Espy Sans and want a font that looks like it that you can use on your screen and printer, you might want to check out my Nu Sans. For a multiple master version, check out Jubal Sans. Also, if you are into the Newton OS, check out my Nu Casual font--which is a outline version of the Newton Casual bitmap font.

There are several great Macintosh-related pages on the net. Here are a few of my favorites: (in no particular order) Macintouch, Mac Central, The Mac Resource, MacNN and Version Tracker. Also check out Macworld, which mentioned my fonts in their Quick Tips section for January 1998 (Thanks Lon Poole!)

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* Previews of Marty's Fonts
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Version History