[iREZ]

Hey folks, I have a 12" Rev B noticed that lately when I visit the MacNN home page I see jumbled text which used to be ok. I have reset Safari, I have reset PRAM, I have restarted, I removed all fonts I had added. I don't know what the culprit is. Anybody willing to take a gander and help me out?

Image of jumbled text, notice that the date is all jumbled but the 30 in August 30th is showing up fine

[madmacgames]

hmm, most of the text seems fine except the date and the headline.

I also have a 12" revB and am not seeing this, at least not now. Out of curiosity, what is the text encoding set to in Safari?

[romeosc]

Go to Safari preferences and check "appearance" and make sure which fonts are selected for proportional.

[nate_02]

I had that start happening on the PC I used to have. I found out that it was overheating. But if it's only happening in Safari, that's probably not the problem.

[iREZ]

Everything seems fine in system pref. Could this be a font problem?

[BearOso]

Originally posted by iREZ:
Everything seems fine in system pref. Could this be a font problem?

I'm pretty sure that's the case. That or the encoding as madmacgames suggested. The jumbled text is actually numbers referring to characters defined in some character set, likely unicode. It's probably substituting a font for sans-serif or helvetica that doesn't have the latin alphabet defined. Can you try going into font book and turn all but the bare necessary fonts off and see if you can pinpoint the problem?

[iREZ]

Yeah I had to do that to get my copy of Word to start up again, kept getting caught on "optimizing font menu." So I removed all the fonts from my system except for what I think were the original fonts. Is there a way to go back to default installed fonts without messing anything up or reinstalling panther?

[BearOso]

Originally posted by iREZ:
Yeah I had to do that to get my copy of Word to start up again, kept getting caught on "optimizing font menu." So I removed all the fonts from my system except for what I think were the original fonts. Is there a way to go back to default installed fonts without messing anything up or reinstalling panther?

Looking at the front page's source, I think the problem is with the Helvetica font. Is Helvetica showing up correctly and does it have dots next to all its variants in font book?
Do you get the same results by going here:
Helvetica Test

[MM-o4]

It's definitely a font = helevetica. I use suitcase and I'm always battleing between versions of helevetica to either display webpage/system level text correctly or for print.

I also get really


big



leading


which


is very



frustrating

Anyone know of a fix? Is the system Helevectica a T1 typeface?

MM-o4

[BearOso]

The system helvetica is apple extended truetype. In my experience any type1 font on MacOS is a bad idea because of type1's innate lack of hinting. I also haven't experienced any of the spacing issues you mention with Apple's default helvetica.

Anyway, if it helps, here is the file I pulled out of my /System/Library/Fonts directory:
Helvetica.dfont
It works for me, maybe it'll work for you guys.

[iREZ]

Here's what the "Helvetica Test" shows up like on my PB. Just so you know its the jumble above the numbers (I even missed it when looking for it).

I noticed that when I disable the Helvetica Font in my 'book, I could read the MacNN front page but there is slight jumbling (ie. a line here a dash there but still readable). So I'm guessing the Helvetica font in my 'book is the case, would I just replace the font with the font you have in your post BearOso? If so what would be the proper procedure for replacing it (do I have to go to my Library and change it, through Font Book, something else....). Thanks a million to all that are trying their best to help me.

[BearOso]

Originally posted by iREZ:
Here's what the "Helvetica Test" shows up like on my PB. Just so you know its the jumble above the numbers (I even missed it when looking for it).

I noticed that when I disable the Helvetica Font in my 'book, I could read the MacNN front page but there is slight jumbling (ie. a line here a dash there but still readable). So I'm guessing the Helvetica font in my 'book is the case, would I just replace the font with the font you have in your post BearOso? If so what would be the proper procedure for replacing it (do I have to go to my Library and change it, through Font Book, something else....). Thanks a million to all that are trying their best to help me.

First check to see whether /System/Library/Fonts/Helvetica.dfont is 217250 bytes in size. If it is, then the font file probably isn't to blame. Otherwise, I'd just copy the file I posted overwriting the existing one and restart to make sure it gets propagated to memory. You could also check in the directories /System/Library/Fonts, /Library/Fonts, and YourUserName/Library/Fonts for any fonts named "Helvetica" that might be overriding the system one.

[iREZ]

My system folder has one Helvetica file at 216KB

I have a Helvetica Neue dfont in my library>fonts

My users>library>fonts has lots of Helvetica fonts


HelveUltCom
Helvetica Neue Extended 3
Helvetica Neue Extended 2
Helvetica Neue Extended 1
Helvetica Neue Condensed 3
Helvetica Neue Condensed 2
Helvetica Neue Condensed 1
Helvetica Neue 3
Helvetica Neue 2
Helvetica Neue 1
Helvetica Narrow
Helvetica Light + Black
Helvetica Fractions
Helvetica Compressed
HelveNeuUltLigIta
HelveNeuUltLigExtObl
HelveNeuUltLigExt
HelveNeuUltLigConObl
HelveNeuUltLigCon
HelveNeuUltLig
HelveNeuThiIta
HelveNeuThiExtObl
HelveNeuThiExt
HelveNeuThiConObl
HelveNeuThiCon
HelveNeuThi
HelveNeuRom
HelveNeuMedIta
HelveNeuMedExtObl
HelveNeuMedExt
HelveNeuMedConObl
HelveNeuMedCon
HelveNeuMed
HelveNeuLigIta
HelveNeuLigExtObl
HelveNeuLigExt
HelveNeuLigConObl
HelveNeuLigCon
HelveNeuLig
HelveNeuIta
HelveNeuHeaIta
HelveNeuHeaExtObl
HelveNeuHeaExt
HelveNeuHeaConObl
HelveNeuHeaCon
HelveNeuHea
HelveNeuExtObl
HelveNeuExtBlaConObl
HelveNeuExtBlaCon
HelveNeuExt
HelveNeuConObl
HelveNeuCon
HelveNeuBolIta
HelveNeuBolExtObl
HelveNeuBolExt
HelveNeuBolConObl
HelveNeuBolCon
HelveNeuBol
HelveNeuBlaIta
HelveNeuBlaExtObl
HelveNeuBlaExt
HelveNeuBlaConObl
HelveNeuBlaCon
HelveNeuBla
HelveNarBolObl
HelveNarBol
HelveNar
HelveLigObl
HelveLig
HelveFraBol
HelveFra
HelveExtCom
HelveCom
HelveBlaObl
HelveBla
HelveNarObl

Could all this be to blame, if so could I just get rid of them completly without ruining my system, or is it just best if I just Archive and Install the system all over again? I just noticed that my iChat will show type fine when I type it but when I enter the message it shows up like jibberish again.

[BearOso]

Wow, that's quite a few fonts. Since you have all those Helvetica variants in your user folder, have you tried creating a new user to see if the same problem persists?

Since there aren't really supposed to be any imperative fonts in $USER/Library/Fonts, I'd say it's safe to erase them. If you want to keep them for any reason, you can move them out and readd them individually until you find the offender.

On the other hand, you might have an application installed in your home directory that also violated the suggested bundling strategy and installed some fonts. Such an application might refuse to work after erasing the fonts.

[d.fine]

I had that problem when I first got my PB. But I had it everywhere, in Safari, Address Book ... annoying as hell since I couldn't read anything. I deleted a font called ' Fractions ' or something of the like, and everything was fixed, maybe you could try that ... good luck.

[iREZ]

Thanks a mil. to all that helped (especially BearOso). I just ended up going through with a erase and install. Had enough room on my iPod and work computer to store all my stuff. Maybe my computer might run a bit smoother due to the fact that I had never done a clean install when I first used my PB, as long as my MacNN work again. I think the problem was that I had a butt load of fonts that used to be handled by suitcase and I tryed switching from that to font book (which always seems to give me problems some how, but I wanted the monkey off my back) and I guess it triggered when putting all my fonts in font book. Thanks again.