Megafont NOW Manager manual?

[Woody44]

I would like to start using the font manager that comes with the Megafont NOW package, but it's not exactly intuitive. I tried clicking on the "About" option under the "Help" tab in the menu bar to see if there is a user manual available but I get an error message:

Cannot open file "C:\Program Files
(x86)\SoftMaker\FontManager\SMSYS\fontman.bmp". The
system cannot find the path specified.

So now I have two questions:

1. Why am I getting this error message?

2. Where can I find a user manual for the Megafont NOW font manager?

[raitis.veksejs]

At the first, you should follow the instructions provided in our e-mail sent to you with the font package "Download the fonts for Windows, Mac and Linux:

To install, first unpack the ZIP archive. Under Windows, simply launch the FONTMAN.EXE application to view and install fonts. On the Apple Mac or in Linux, install the fonts by double-clicking on them."

1. The most obvious reason for fault message is an incompletely unpacked ZIP archive. Delete the unpacked folder megafontnow and try to unpack it again.
2. There doesn't exist any special user manual for the Megafont NOW font manager. You can install fonts by selecting them and pressing the command button "+" or uninstall with "-".
Additionally, you can browse folder megafontnow/fonts and install fonts according to fonts installation instructions for your operating system. For example, in Windows "All fonts are stored in the C:\Windows\Fonts folder. You can add fonts by simply dragging font files from the extracted files folder into this folder. Windows will automatically install them. If you want to see what a font looks like, open the Fonts folder, right-click the font file, and then click Preview."

You can find more information about Megafont NOW font package also on our blog:
https://www.softmaker.com/en/blog/typog ... nt-manager

[Woody44]

I don't need to install fonts, I need to manage the fonts I already have installed. The information on the blog page in your link doesn't explain how to do that -- it just says that the font manager can do it. Which is what I wrote in my opening post.

I have received a response from the customer support e-mail system that provides a bit more information. The process is not at all intuitive, and I remain of the opinion that the font manager really NEEDS a good, complete user manual.

[raitis.veksejs]

Unfortunately, there doesn't exist a special user manual for Megafont NOW Manager, but as a paid customer you can ask questions to the support team or here on the forums. Just describe step by step what you are actually trying to do and what the result should be.

We will be glad to help you! I'll forward your request about the user manual to our product management team.

[Woody44]

Has there been any progress on creating a user manual for the Megafont NOW font manager? I still need a font manager, and I am unable to figure out how to use Megafont NOW. I'm quite certain that it seems easy and intuitive to the people who created it and who know how to use it. From the perspective of a customer, it is not at all intuitive -- it is unusable.

[miguel-c]

I find the font manager included in MegaFont NOW easy to use, but maybe it's because I've used font managers for more than 20 years now.
However, I personally use another font manager that is free and probably easier for you to use. It's called Fontbase.
Instructions:
1. Download it here: https://fontba.se/
2. Install
3. Launch it
4. Add the extracted Megafont\Fonts folder to it
5. Scroll down the list of real examples of the fonts in use using the default lazy fox text, or select ABDEF.... from the dropdown list

[Woody44]

Miguel, thanks for the suggestion about Fontbase, but without an explanation of what it does and how to use it, it's not helpful.

I have bought the Megafont NOW collection. I also have a lot of other fonts that I have accumulated over the years. If I were to install all of them, my computer would be completely overwhelmed. Even with just a fraction of my fonts installed in Windows, when I open a document in TextMaker and go to the font list, the selection is mind-boggling. I like the concept of being able to assign fonts to categories (such as "Book Interior") so when I look at the list of fonts I don't have to scroll through a huge number of display fonts to get to a few good text fonts.

Supposedly, the Megafont NOW font manager allows activating and deactivating font groups -- but without any explanation of how this works, it's useless. I have installed the Megafont NOW font manager, but it's just sitting there as an unused shortcut on my desktop because I can't figure out how to use it. Asking questions through the support forum here isn't the solution. I don't even know where to start -- before you can ask questions, you have to at least know what you don't know.

Please ... create a user manual for the font manager.

[miguel-c]

OK, I've forwarded your request for the Font Manager manual...

[Woody44]

It is almost a year later, and I still do not have a font manager that I can use. In addition to Megafont NOW, I have also tried FontBase (Miguel's suggestion), Nexus Font, and High-Logic MainType. All have been recommended or suggested by various people who (allegedly) use them successfully. I am one of those people who need to have things explained. I can't make any of them work -- because I don't know where to begin.

Please PLEASE produce a user manual for the Megafont NOW font manager. Something has just installed about 75 gazillion "Noto" fonts on my computer. I manually deleted them all, and they are back. I suspect they were installed with an update to LibreOffice (yes, I have purchased and use SoftMaker Office Pro, but I also keep LibreOffice on my computer for testing). I urgently need a way to manage/control this mess.

[SuperTech]

I have forwarded this improvement suggestion again…

[lgsl]

It is almost a year later, and I still do not have a font manager that I can use. In addition to Megafont NOW, I have also tried FontBase (Miguel's suggestion), Nexus Font, and High-Logic MainType. All have been recommended or suggested by various people who (allegedly) use them successfully. I am one of those people who need to have things explained. I can't make any of them work -- because I don't know where to begin.

Please PLEASE produce a user manual for the Megafont NOW font manager. Something has just installed about 75 gazillion "Noto" fonts on my computer. I manually deleted them all, and they are back. I suspect they were installed with an update to LibreOffice (yes, I have purchased and use SoftMaker Office Pro, but I also keep LibreOffice on my computer for testing). I urgently need a way to manage/control this mess.

Is my understanding that Megafont's utility is simply to mange Megafont NOW's fonts. It certainly is not an all-propose font manager. As it was suggested here FontBase is a fine tool for the job. I haven not use it recently, but it can handle huge font collections. There are other pro tools out there too (I do manage fonts manually myself, so I am not up to date with this tools) and plenty of video tutorials out there to help you learn to use them.

[Woody44]

Is my understanding that Megafont's utility is simply to mange Megafont NOW's fonts. It certainly is not an all-propose font manager. As it was suggested here FontBase is a fine tool for the job. I haven not use it recently, but it can handle huge font collections. There are other pro tools out there too (I do manage fonts manually myself, so I am not up to date with this tools) and plenty of video tutorials out there to help you learn to use them.

That's a bit of a surprise -- and quite disappointing if correct. On a Windows computer, we start of with a fairly large collection of fonts just from Windows, and anyone who has purchased Microsoft Office or subscribed to Microsoft 365 has a large bunch of fonts more. The fonts in Megafont NOW are all TrueType or OpenType fonts, and so are the Microsoft Fonts. How would the SoftMaker font manager utility know to only handle SoftMaker's fonts? If it is limited to only the fonts in Megafont NOW, it's useless. I do hope you are incorrect.