Excellent. Now, anyone want to attempt a brief tale-of-the-tape for Fontographer vs. TypeTool or FontLab? I can see how this is very welcome news for FOG vets, but it doesn’t make much sense for newbies to try and pick up FOG at this point, right?

Here is Fontlab’s point-form product feature comparison chart for starters:

http://www.fontlab.com/Font-tools/Product-Comparison-Chart/

I’d buy it if I could only customize the keyboard commands.

...and if it was offered at a discounted “downgrade” price for FontLab users.

Just outta curiousity, how is it that Typetool, as a scaled down Fontlab, supports more characters than FontLab Studio?

Hey look, an upgrade — nine years later! Is there a record for this kind of delay in the software world (excluding Y2K core updates)?

Anyhoo, thanks for picking up the ball, FontLab. You guys rock.

hey, the first “bug”: problem with the Installer; where’s my upgrade?

http://www.fontlab.com/Font-tools/Product-Comparison-Chart/

;) this is interesting: “Undo” is N/A in Fog now.

I’ve only used FL since spring (after 16 yrs or Fog), drawing 30 or so fonts in that time. Here is a top list of things Fog Does Better in the LETTER DRAWING phase of type design:

1. End points connect like they know they are supposed to in Fog. In FL, they need to be no farther apart than the thickness of a flea’s pubic hair in order to get the points (connected).
2. FL bolding adds, sometimes dozens of, unwanted points. Fog = 0.
3. FL interpolation is practically useless for the same reason as #2, i.e. it does not understand matching points, the cleanup is more work that manual
Interpolation.
4. Fog is smart enough to know that when you have the pen tool, and you click on a contour, it should add a point to the contour, (you can draw all day long with Fogs pen without EVER changing tools). FL = special tool for the same simple function, change tool, change tool, change tool.
5. Fog’s metrics window knew that the baseline was not ness., in fact it’s a distraction to good spacing. FL Lets you know exactly where the baseline is in the metrics window whether you like it or not.
6. type an unoccupied character in Fog, it shows up blank. FL crashes 50% of the time, and otherwise misbehaves when you type the as yet defined.
7. Fog = Correct path direction. FL = Reverse all contours. The former just works, the latter, I don’t even know why they bother unless you’re supposed to delete every contour that is correct, “Reverse all contours” to correct the contour(s) that are wrong.
8. 15% of all zooms in FL’s glyph window fly to a minuscule and uneditable 12 point. Fog = 0% of all zooms are correct.
9. FL is seriously deranged about the differences between “copy”, “delete”, and “merge”. Fog’s got it 100% right. (In FL, I still have not figured out how to select more than one point and merge the contour around it...)
10. Fog has a tiny number of icons for all the tools you need, and every single one is useful every day. FL is Totally Nuts about tools and icons.

Things on the other side of the ledger:
1. FL is pretty. Fog is not.
2. FL goes on, Fog does not.
:-)

FL supports the development of OpenType fonts (without using an external compiler) and Fog does not. FL is the 777 to Fog’s Sopwith Camel. You can’t fly a 777 through a barn, but you can’t carry 500 passengers in a Camel.

Yes, the drawing environments are different, in much the same way that Illustrator and FreeHand’s drawing environments are different. Which one’s better? The depends upon which one you like use best.

Personally, I was delighted to make the wholesale switch to FontLab in 2002, and I haven’t looked back since. I have had the chance to poke around with FogX, and was amused by the anachronism: made me want to thrown on some neon legwarmers and fire up the Flashdance soundtrack.

All of which to say: If you’re a devoted FogHat, you’ll be delighted to have the application ported and tweaked for use on OS X. If you’ve made the switch to FontLab and are happy with it, you probably won’t find a reason to switch back to Fontographer.

David, I think you nailed it with your list... Fog feels like a type ‘designing’ tool to me, whereas Flab has always felt like a type ‘programming’ tool. I’m not adverse to programming and the more technical aspects of type development, but if it gets in the way of the design process, then a different tool needs to be used. I use both applications, and I prefer them for different reasons.

> “2. FL goes on, Fog does not.”

The fact that Fog 4.7 has been released at all negates this point entirely.

Thank goodness Fog is a player again.

>Thank goodness Fog is a player again.

Speaking of “play” and “again”:

But you’ve always had the ability to go back. All you have to do is boot up your old Mac, click two times and say, “There’s no place like FOG. There’s no place like FOG...”

It will be more interesting when they do the real upgrade—FOG 5—due out next summer.

David: are you on FontLab Studio 5/Mac beta list? If not - contact me - most of things in your list are fixed.

Mark: I think that even more interesting it will be when we release Fontlab Studio with all best Fog features.

> “2. FL goes on, Fog does not.”
“The fact that Fog 4.7 has been released at all ...”
No, I mean the real tool, not 4.anything. I only ever used 4.x in a pinch, and never for drawing. Getting 3.5 to work in X’d be a hoot, but that ain’t gonna happen.
The overall appearance, interacitve piece-wise scaling of parts, “I’m sure there must be some way to do this” adventure, continuing into the “I’m sure there must be a better way to do this” adventure, makes FL worth sticking to, at least until I get to it’s last nook. Sure, I could’ve drawn 50 fonts in the same time in my old Fog, but those days are gone, My list is for FL improvements (; O O ;)

> when we release Fontlab Studio with all best Fog features.

when?

> when?

We are working on it. Right now. :-)

By the way, I didn’t run into any issues with the demo installer. Has anyone else had a problem like Mr Hamuel experienced? Just wondering...

Yuri, is there a definitive list of what ‘bugs’ were actually ‘fixed’?

Cheers.

They* fixed it; just ordered FogLamp and faced the same issue, but right now - everything is fine!

(* well... Lisa Devlin fixed that).

> Mr Hamuel

ahhh.... this is too heavy Mr Hutchinson :)

Grant: not much. Layout of all dialogs is updated to match current UI standards, some old crash-bugs were fixed, embedding problem is fixed, clipboard exchange with AI works (do not forget to turn on AICB option in AI files & clipboard preferences) and all encodings are updated to include Euro. Also, few things in TT export were fixed so it basically produces better TT fonts. Anyway, we recommend to post-process Fog export using TransType or a combination of FogLamp and TransType.

A quite bizarre event, from an open-minded, big-hearted company.
It hasn’t been easy for the tech-minded FontLab to accomodate the criticisms of diehard Fogoholics, but they have found ways to make Flab more user-friendly, e.g. working with indie-foundry beta-testers — and now this.

Yes! I second Nick’s statement. Let’s all send thanks to Yuri, Cyril, and the team in Russia, and Ted, Lisa, and the American team. Without their tireless work we type types would be in quite the pickle, selling our rubdown sheets door-to-door.
Thanks.
c

PS; I forgot to shout-out to Adam, whose knowledge of the software is invaluable; hiring him was one of the best things FontLab has ever done.

David,

thanks for your list — it’s almost as good as your list of 10 things you like about Matthew Carter :)

> 1. End points connect like they know they
> are supposed to in Fog. In FL, they need
> to be no farther apart than the thickness
> of a flea’s pubic hair in order to get
> the points (connected).

In FontLab 4.6 or FontLab Studio 5: Options / Glyph Window / Snap-to distance. Set to 50 and you’ll be talking elephant pubic hair.

> 2. FL bolding adds, sometimes dozens of, unwanted points. Fog = 0.

Agreed. I believe FontLab Studio 5 has some improvements on this, but in addition, FontLab Studio 5.5 will include Fontographer’s “Change Weight” command.

> 3. FL interpolation is practically useless
> for the same reason as #2, i.e. it does not
> understand matching points, the cleanup is
> more work that manual Interpolation.

This has been improved in FontLab Studio 5. FontLab Studio 5.5 will probably alternatively include Fontographer’s blending algorithm.

> 4. Fog is smart enough to know that when
> you have the pen tool, and you click on
> a contour, it should add a point to the
> contour, (you can draw all day long with
> Fogs pen without EVER changing tools).
> FL = special tool for the same simple
> function, change tool, change tool, change tool.

Agreed. This is still subject to improvement in FontLab Studio.

> 5. Fog’s metrics window knew that the
> baseline was not ness., in fact it’s a
> distraction to good spacing. FL Lets
> you know exactly where the baseline is
> in the metrics window whether you like
> it or not.

FontLab Studio 5 has a multiline spacing and kerning window where you can turn everything off and have a very plain interface.

> 6. type an unoccupied character in Fog,
> it shows up blank. FL crashes 50% of the
> time, and otherwise misbehaves when you
> type the as yet defined.

I believe you will see great improvements on this in FontLab Studio 5.

> 7. Fog = Correct path direction. FL =
> Reverse all contours. The former just
> works, the latter, I don’t even know
> why they bother unless you’re supposed
> to delete every contour that is correct,
> “Reverse all contours” to correct the
> contour(s) that are wrong.

No. In FontLab 4.6, pick Tools / Transform / Contour / Reverse all and fr