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davehomsey
davehomsey
Participant
March 14, 2019
Question

Mac to PC font recognition

  • March 14, 2019
  • 2 replies
  • 987 views

I'm using the same Google fonts on a PC desktop and a Mac laptop and yet when I share my InDesign documents from one to the other, the document doesn't recognize the fonts and I need to do a Replace Font. I assumed Google fonts, which are Opentype, would be seamless across platforms.

Can anybody shed any light? Any issues I should be looking for?

Thank you!

This topic has been closed for replies.

2 replies

Dov Isaacs
Dov Isaacs
Legend
March 15, 2019

Assuming that the exact same font file is installed on both the Mac and the Windows systems, there should be no issue whatsoever in terms of Adobe products recognizing the font as same font between the two platforms.

However, if you installed a copy of a font on the Mac and later downloaded a copy of what purports to be the same font to your Windows system, but they are different versions of the same font, this may be cause of the symptoms you are seeing. For better or worse, some fonts seem to “updated” on a fairly regular basis.

          - Dov

- Dov Isaacs, former Adobe Principal Scientist (April 30, 1990 - May 30, 2021)
    BobLevine
    Community Expert
    BobLevineCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    March 15, 2019

    Great point, Dov.

    Here’s an idea.

    On either machine, package an InDesign document that uses and recognizes the fonts. Copy the document fonts folder from that package and install the fonts (I’m assuming these are free to use Google Fonts. Check EULA for others) on the other machine.

      Dov Isaacs
      Dov Isaacs
      Legend
      March 15, 2019

      Actually, one of the reasons for the package option was to assure that when copying from one system to another (whether the same or different platform), the assets remain the same. If you do copy the package from Mac to Windows, you shouldn't even need to install the fonts at all. InDesign looks first in the fonts subdirectory for the required fonts before even looking at what was installed!

                - Dov

      - Dov Isaacs, former Adobe Principal Scientist (April 30, 1990 - May 30, 2021)
        BobLevine
        Community Expert
        BobLevineCommunity Expert
        Community Expert
        March 14, 2019

        As long as the fonts are properly installed there shouldn't be a problem.

        davehomsey
        davehomseyAuthor
        Participant
        March 15, 2019

        Thanks, Bob. If the fonts are working on both machines, can they still be improperly installed to create this cross-platform problem? Do you know of any common errors in font installation I should look for?

        BobLevine
        Community Expert
        BobLevineCommunity Expert
        Community Expert
        March 15, 2019

        I really have no idea why this would be an issue with the identical font installed on both machines.

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