Why Do My Fonts in Netscape Navigator Look Funny?
Applies to: Navigator and Communicator (all versions)Operating Systems: Windows 3.x, Windows 95, andWindows
Problem: If you can't see what you are typing - (maybe it seems like "white-on-white"), are typing in form fields that are "half-height", have one part of the screen that seems to be displayed in greek, cyrillic,swahili, sanscrit, etc., have printed output that seems to be in greek, cyrillic, swahili, sanscrit,etc., have any other funny thing happening when your digits hit those little square things with labels on them - You may have "The Font Problem". This is the #1 problem with all versions of Netscape.
Introduction: (Also good for print problems) If you are running Windows, and you seem to have text written in Greek or Russian, or the text is invisible in one of the areas of your Netscape Navigator screen, you have a font problem. While relatively rare, font problems are among the most difficult to solve of the Navigator bugs. The primary cause appears to lie in the way Navigator selects its fonts from those made available under Windows. What follows is a partially edited reproduction of various "solutions" to the font problem. Most involve disabling, or re-ordering, the list of fonts so that Navigator selects "good" fonts as it goes thru the font list. The ways of doing this differ for Win3.1 and Win95 so read carefully. If someone wants to create a briefer, better text for this subject be my guest :)
Solutions: If you run Rumba, go to bottom, otherwise, first look for phonetic.fon.
"Well I just solved my White on White problem with win95.I moved all of the font files to a different directory in case something went wrong. Then I got my old win 3.1 disks out and copied all of the font files into \windows\fonts directory. I can see!!!! Later I am going to move most of my other fonts back to see what happens. It looked like there was some old fonts that wasn't there anymore in win95. I wonder if it was looking for a font that wasn't there....Good luck, Jerry"
"I found the answer boys and girls!! The font name is phonetic.fon. It was hidden and Windows wouldn't let me do anything with it while it was running so you have to shut down to dos mode and move the file to a floppy. It may have the attrib set so look for it. It was in my Windows\fonts directory. Sorry it took so long, it took me days of rebooting and I have a lot of fonts."
"Thanks a lot! It works perfectly for me. However, the file PHONETIC.FON is in my \WINDOWS\SYSTEM, not \WINDOWS\FONTS; so you should check in all Windows-related directories."
"I was able to cure my problem in Netscape 2.0 by removing the font "WPBoxDrawing"."
"The one that fixed my problem was to remove a font, USPOST.FON, a zip code, bar code font, inserted by a mailing program. With it in, I have invisible data entry forms, With it out, I have visible data entry. I'm on WFWG 3.11, using sysedit, I commented out (;) all fonts, except Arial, Courier New, Times New, and Universe. Exit & restart windows, then start netscape. Fonts work. Then add then back in small groups until it fails again. USPOST.FON was the one confusing Netscape."
Fonts known to cause problems: phonetic.fon - WPBoxDrawing - monotype - sortsuspost.fon - mcsrack.fon
Now Dan Moore's very nice intro to the topic: "Ages ago when the font problem hit me, I came up with the re-ordering fix because that's what fixed an identical problem with CorelDraw 3.0 or 4.0 a couple years ago. Some software install their own fonts so they know that what they need will be there (e.g., lots of comm programs install terminal fonts so they can display IBM ASCII instead of Win ANSI/ISO). If you don't install your own fonts, then you must rely on already-installed fonts to do the job for you. You can't predict what fonts will be installed (e.g., some folks might remove Arial, Courier, and Times New Roman and you can't assume they will be there). The way these programs pick a font is to go through the installed font list, whose order is determined by Windows, and check the font properties (i.e., character set, style, available variants etc.). They pick the first one that matches. The problem is, they may not filter out undesirable attributes that make the font unreadable at small point sizes (style, size, decorative, script etc.). So the only solution is to remove these fonts, or change their order so that the program will find a "readable" font first.
And now, a bunch of other fixes:
"I have at last cracked the white on white problem. After reading many posts full of good advice I realized that the problemlies in the resolution I am working in. Running Win 95 no other applications have any problem with any fonts and looking in Fonts all the required resolution fonts are installed. This is not so if you go into the registry. Here the only installed fixed font was for VGA resolution. Adding COURF.FON to the registry did the trick and I am now in 800x600 and, for the first time, reading what I typed. For those of you that want the place to add is as follows... Run Regedit then select HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE then CONFIG then 0001 then DISPLAY then FONTS, then add Courf.fon to the list and restart the machine. At last that was the routine on my machine. Hope this helps others.
"Are you saying that when you change video driver or driver resolution in Win95, it does not automatically install the required fixed font files for that driver? Are you using Win 3.1 drivers under Win95?" "That would appear to be the case but I haven't rechecked by changing resolution. I'll give that a try and see what happens. I'm using a Win95 driverOK a little research later. Changing from 800x600 to VGA REMOVES thecourf.fon without any trouble. Changing back to 800x600 DOES NOT put the font back in. I have to do this manually! I guess this is a problem with the video drivers. SPEA V7 Mercury lite BIG WIN drivers."
On a similar note: "I have found the answer. I myself was a victim of this problem and did not know where to turn. But through patience and having a roommate that is a computer genius, I (I mean we) have found the solution to the white on white text/font problem... The cause is that in win95 one or all of your font files has somehow become corrupt, and our solution was to remove all of the fonts while windows is running (and mind you it get's pretty ugly) and then reinstall all available fonts."
A very different solution: "Usually, it is simply that your configuration has been changed to where the text is the same color as the background you have chosen. Go to "options/general preferences/colors" and make sure the text, followed text, and background colors are very different. Uncheck alwaysuse my settings", if it is checked."
Netscape Tech Note 10118:
Netscape Navigator on Windows displays unreadable symbol fonts
Created: 12/06/95 by Brian
Last modified: 12/08/95 by Brian
Product: Netscape Navigator
Operating system: Microsoft Windows
There are three reasons that Netscape Navigator might display sometext in an unreadable symbol (usually Greek) font under Windows 3.1and Windows 95: - If you have a font named "Monotype Sorts" on your system, then remove it (via the Fonts control panel) and see if that solves the problem. Some software which installs this font (such as Lotus SmartSuite) might put a corrupt copy of the font file ("mtsorts_.ttf") onto your system, which could interfere with the other fonts that you use. If you have Adobe Type Manager running, turn it off and reboot. That will sometimes solve the problem. If you're seeing the wrong font appear on your printouts, then possibly your printer doesn't support the font you've chosen for Netscape Navigator to use. Select "Preferences" from the Options menu, go to the "Fonts" section, and try selecting different proportional and fixed fonts.
A font fix from PC Magazine:
The paragraph I sent you about making fonts read-only appeared in the 11-21-95 issue of PC Magazine, Page 85, in Bill Machrone's "Second Looks" column. Thanks, Jim Fuller - Fix for Netscape Bug - "Who knows what weird and wonderful bugs will have crept into and out of Netscape Navigator by the time you read this. Version 1.22 has a nasty habit of erasing all your TrueType fonts or just rendering them invisible to Windows. One reader solved the problem by simply marking all the fonts read-only. It works."
"So, it was driving me nuts that the font used to display the footer in Netscape was always some obscure symbol/fences/Greek-typefont. Finally, I just moved the following font files (using 2 explorer windows) from the \windows\fonts directory to \windows\oldfonts:Symbol.ttfvgasb.fonsymbolf.fonAfter restarting Netscape it now seems toshow a legible font as in the message bar! I tried to solve the problem by varying fonts in both Windows 3.11 FWG and in Netscape. 1. From program manager, File Run SYSEDIT 2. Find [Fonts] section in WIN.INI3. Find entries (4 ea.) for Courier New, Arial, Times New Roman fonts.4. Moves these entries (12 of them) at top of list below [Fonts] header.5. Save WIN.INI, exit SYSEDIT, exit windows, restart windows. This fixed the same problem on my wfw3.11 system."
"The font problem can be solved by going into windows 95 and go into control panel-fonts. Use the first "courier" fonts by double clicking. Connect with Netscape to the server and the fonts should be okay. Sometimes the change is permanent, sometimes not. Shut down of the computer and startup may have to include this fixing font step to run Netscape."
Have had this problem with all versions of NS 2.0+. After reading the various comments in this news group and trying all these remedies for no avail I tried my own drastic one which worked.Clean out all fonts except the statutory Win 3.1 fonts (Arial, Courier New, and Times Roman + some other special fonts). I eliminated more than was needed and then had to add some of the special raster fonts back in. Re-invoke windows and netcape worked just fine, but some basic windows fonts were changed, i.e the menu and icon fonts were incorrect due to a missing windows font. This missing font was added and everything was OK with Netscape and its text entry. Add back-in all the custom fonts. It's a lot easier with a fontmanager like MS Font Manager which comes with the Font Pack 1, etc. Everything is now happy in the world of windows and Netscape! This seems a very drastic approach to what should be accommodated in Netscape as standard font compatibility.
"Probably has Nothing to with ALL GPF problems but....I turned of ATM (Adobe Type Manager) on my 486DX2-66 w/16meg; runningWindows 95 and two things happened. My Netscape Header and Footer Print FONT problem is GONE!" Bill
Rumba / Navigator Incompatibility: "The problem does go away when I start Netscape first, and does not return if I later start Rumba. It seems that which app gets to the fonts first, determines whether the problem will occur. Just a minute ago, I fired up netscape, checked and did not have a font problem. I then started rumba, re-checked, and still no problem. (i've been using the search string window in Webcrawler to demonstrate the problem). Then, I fired up the news windows, and am having the problem now in any news responses. Ive just gone backand checked the browser session, and it does not have the problem.I'm not at all sure where this leads us, other than to say any netscape apps I start after a rumba app will have the problem." Al Gerharter
