FontViewer 1.2 may be used and distributed freely, provided that
1. only a nominal copying fee is charged,
2. this file is included,
3. if FontViewer is included with other programs in a compilation disk or set of disks, then a copy of these disk/s is sent to me.
FontViewer may not be used for any commercial purposes without express written permission.
FontViewer is yet another program to view fonts.
Version 1.2 is an update of Version 1.1. The main change is to allow for some of the new Workbench 2.0 features.
Its main features are
- low res, high res and interlace screen resolutions
- screen resolution can be changed while program is running
- up to thirty fonts can be viewed at one time
- each loaded font has its own window
- fonts can be viewed in Bold, Italic and Underline
- support for Workbench 2.0 Outline fonts
- support for ColorFonts
- adjustable palette for ColorFonts
- up to three lines of changeable text for viewing fonts
- screen resolution and font directory can be specified
by CLI parameters or Icon tooltypes
- Use file requester to find fonts to view (Workbench 2.0 only)
Installing FontViewer:
All that is required is to drag the FontViewer icon into whatever drawer you wish it to be in - on either a hard or floppy disk. There are no other files needed for operation and no assigns are needed.
Double-click the FontViewer icon to run. If running from the CLI type the program name. CLI parameters and Icon tooltypes can be used to override default settings. These will be covered later. After starting the program, a control window will open on the Workbench screen and a separate screen will be opened for viewing the fonts on.
Loading Fonts:
On the right of the control window is a scroll box containing a list of the available fonts in the current fonts directory. The string gadget beside this box allows you to change to a new directory for fonts. If you are using Workbench 2.0, then clicking in the small "Disk" gadget to the left of the string gaget will bring up the standard ASL file requester where you can enter the name of the directory to search for fonts.
Click on one of the fonts in the list and a list of the available sizes in that font will appear. If you are using Workbench 2.0, then the top entry will be called "Other...". Clicking on this entry will bring up a string gadget where you can enter whatever size you wish. If the font you choose to load is an Outline font, and there are no bitmap sizes already created for that font, then a list of different sizes will be displayed, as well as the "Other..." choice.
If you click on one of the sizes provided, or you enter a specific size, the font will be loaded in that size and displayed in a new window on the font viewing screen.
When a list of font sizes is displayed, the font directory string gadget changes to the 'List Fonts' gadget. Clicking on this gadget will relist the fonts.
To remove a font from the font viewing screen, click on its window's close gadget.
The font windows can be resized and repositioned anywhere on the font viewing screen. Clicking in a font window will bring it to the front and make it the active window.
The font style (bold,italic,underline) of the active window can be changed by using the gadgets to the left of the font scroll box in the control window.
The resolution of the font viewing screen can be changed by using the screen resolution gadgets in the middle of the control window.
The font viewing screen can be moved to the top of the display by pressing the Up cursor key. It can be moved back down to its original position by pressing the Down cursor key. You can also use the mouse to drag the screen to any position you like.
ColorFonts are supported. Load them as for any other font. If the number of colours in the ColorFont is greater than the number of colours in the font viewing screen, the screen will be changed accordingly. Each ColorFont that is loaded will have its own palette which will be displayed whenever its window is the active one. The palette of the active window can be altered by clicking on the 'Palette' gadget.
The text that the fonts are displayed in can be altered by clicking on the 'Set Text' gadget. A window will appear with four preset text styles and a large string gadget where you can enter custom text. Click on one of the preset styles or the 'Custom' gadget if you want to enter your own. Up to three lines of text can be entered. Clicking on the 'Save Custom' gadget saves the custom text as a file called "s:FontViewer.text". When FontViewer runs, it checks to see if this file exists and loads it if it does. The five available text styles (four presets and one custom) are known as styles 0-4, reading from left to right. One of these styles can be specified as the startup one (this is covered later). The default style is number 1 - three lines of text, top one upper case, middle one lower case, and bottom one numerals.
Assigning fonts:
When you change the directory that you are loading fonts from, FontViewer does not change the Fonts: assign.
Under Workbench 1.2 or 1.3, this can lead to trouble when using floppy disk based systems, particularly if you only have one drive. This is because the disk that Fonts: is assigned to must be present in the system to load a font. In a single drive system, the Fonts: disk (usually your boot disk) and the disk containing the font you want to load can not be in the drive at the same time. To get around this, either
1. rename the disk containing the font to "Fonts".
2. use the name of the disk, not the drive when specifying
the disk/directory eg "FontDisk1:fonts" not "DF0:fonts".
3. assign Fonts: to something that is always in the system
eg In a CLI window, type "assign fonts: ram:"
Under Workbench 2.0, the assigned Fonts: directory does not have to be present in the system to load a standard Bitmap font. To load an Outline font however, the system needs to access files in the 'Fonts:_Bullet' directory, and will not create the font if they are not found. This should only cause problems if you are using a floppy disk based system, which is highly impractical with Outline fonts anyway.
Iconify:
Clicking on the 'Iconify' gadget will reduce FontViewer to a small icon on the Workbench screen.
Under Workbench 1.2/1.3, this icon will appear as a window title bar. To reactivate the program, click once on the title bar with the left mouse button (to make it active) and then click once with the right mouse button. If you click in the CloseWindow gadget, FontViewer will quit.
Under Workbench 2.0, the icon will be an AppIcon. This means that if you drop another icon on top of the FontViewer icon, the name of this icon will be used as the font directory to search, and FontViewer will reopen. If you double-click on the FontViewer icon, then FontViewer will reopen using the old font directory.
Startup Options:
FontViewer has several options that can be specified on the command line if using a CLI, or in the Icon tooltypes if using the Workbench.
The default options are high resolution, non-interlace screen,
text style 1, and font directory "Fonts:".
These can be altered as follows.
From CLI:
-l uses a low resolution screen
-i turns interlace on
-t[number] uses text style [number]
A string not beginning with any of the above will be treated as the font directory to be used.
The full pathname of this directory should be used.
All of these commands are optional and can be in any order.
eg FontViewer -l -i -t0 df0:fonts
will start FontViewer in a low resolution, interlace screen using the custom text (s:FontViewer.text) and search df0:fonts for fonts.
From Workbench:
Change the tooltypes in the FontViewer icon.
The following are the only options allowed and must be entered exactly as shown.
SCREEN=LOW
INTERLACE=ON
TEXTSTYLE=<number> where <number> is the number of the text style
eg TEXTSTYLE=1
FONTDIR=<directory> where <directory> is the full path name of the
required directory eg FONTDIR=df0:fonts
If any of these options (either CLI or Workbench) are not present then the defaults will be used.
