Designers make use of all kinds of specialized applications when it comes to working with fonts. Much like with image editing, everything from heavyweight application suites to the smallest of freeware programs can be essential in getting the job done right, but a good management application is a must, no matter how you work with the fonts. Between the massive number of available fonts and the fact that you can only install so many on your computer without things getting out of hand, good font management is essential. Apple does offer a FontBook application, which is more than enough for the average user, but for keeping tabs on thousands of fonts you need something with a bit more punch… something like Font Pilot.


What it does

Font Pilot lets you have your fonts without them getting in the way. It lets you keep a database of fonts, and allows you to see everything you want about them, but fonts don't need to actually be installed unless you want them to be. Even when it does come to installing fonts, everything is clean and you control how long you keep them.


Working with it

Font Pilot works mainly out of its main window that is split into three areas. You have your collections, the font list and the details pane, that can contain various information depending on what you need.

Collections are virtual groups that will house fonts, but have no bearing outside the actual application. They are not exclusive and any font can be in as many collections as you need. Similarly, deleting collections has no bearing upon the actual fonts themselves. In the middle is the list of all the fonts in the current collection. This can be viewed either by font families or by font files. Each of the available entries can be expanded to see a preview of the font, or collapsed to save space. This can be used to quickly make selections simply by collapsing the ones you are not interested in.

The detail pane has three tabs and each one has very specific information. The preview text is common to all font applications, and should be familiar. Font Pilot actually gives you a very flexible preview letting you change both the preview text and the colors of the font and background, saving you from having to open the font in some other application to make the color changes. The details tab provides pretty much the same information as FontBook, including the font creator and version, names of the font and the encoding. Last but not least is the metrics tab, which is invaluable if you are doing very precise work. Here you can find information about the properties of the font characters themselves, such as the ascent, descent, underline position, italic angle and much, much more. Unfortunately, the details pane will not remember what tab you were in when changing fonts, so to compare the metrics of multiple fonts you have to reselect the tab for each and every one.


Font in, font out

Because you don't want all available fonts installed, Font Pilot makes it easy to manage what goes where. Fonts and entire folders can be previewed with the click of a button, and when you do come across that font that you really need, you can choose how to use it. Font Pilot lets you install fonts, meaning that they will become available for all users and applications instantly. However, should you wish it, you can also activate fonts, which will accomplish the same thing, but that's only temporary. Activated fonts will only last until the next restart, after which they will be gone as if they were never there. This is a great way to load up on all the fonts you need for just a short time, without actually having to bother to go back and get them out.


Character details

Character details are a pretty standard feature for font management programs, letting you see all the characters of a given font and additional information related to them such as the ASII, hex, octal and binary code. Font Pilot also shows you the keyboard combinations needed for that character, both for the Mac and a PC. This is very practical if you work in a mixed environment and need to input characters on a system you are not familiar with. The keyboard viewer that is also accessible from here can help further by providing a dynamic preview of the entire keyboard depending on the modifier keys currently pressed.


The Good

Makes it easy to see the fonts and work with them. The ability to temporarily install fonts and the metric details are simply fantastic.

The Bad

Little things such as the details pane constantly resetting to the preview tab can be very annoying.

The Truth

Font Pilot may not be perfect, but it is very good under many aspects. The only shortcomings are mostly interface-related.

Here are some screenshots, click to enlarge: