Fonts in Windows

To the average PC user, fonts may not seem like the most interesting of topics . However, there is more to the subject than many may think. Windows comes with a considerable assortment of different types of fonts and characters that allow for considerable flexibility in format and a wide assortment of distinctive and artistic effects in Windows documents. There is support for a number of languages and for many special symbols. In this article, I will cover some of the aspects of Windows fonts and some ways that you can liven up your documents or make use of the special symbols.

The fonts on the Windows system

Font files have the extension .FON or .TTF (true-type) and are listed in the special system folder /Windows/Fonts/. (If you have additional fonts that are specific to a particular printer, those may be elsewhere and have a different extension.) The system font folder can also be reached through Control Panel-Fonts. To see what a font looks like, left double-click on its file (or right-click and choose "Open"). This procedure can be tedious if you are interested in looking at more than one or two fonts or if you want to compare fonts. There are many software programs, some free, some shareware, for viewing or managing fonts. One good freeware program is from Karen Kenworthy. Others can be found at any of the software download sites like NoNags. Also a reference with an extensive list is given in the sidebar.

The standard Windows installations have around 100-200 fonts (the exact number depending on your setup). The following fonts are included with Windows and are installed on every computer

* Courier New (TrueType, including Bold, Italic, and Bold Italic variations)
* Arial (TrueType, including Bold, Italic, and Bold Italic variations)
* Times New Roman (TrueType, including Bold, Italic, and Bold Italic variations)
* Symbol (TrueType)
* Wingdings (TrueType)
* MS Serif
* MS Sans Serif