X-Fonter 14.0

Fonts in Windows

How Fonts Work in Windows

Windows holds an internal font table with information about the fonts that it is currently aware of. All the fonts whose resources are loaded have an entry in that table.

Basically there are only a few things an application can do with fonts.
1. Ask for a list of the available fonts.
2. Use a certain font.

When you want to choose a font in almost any application, you get a dropdown with the available fonts. This list of fonts was retrieved from the windows font table.

Loading a font means that it is temporarily added to the fonts table (and made available to other programs). When you restart windows this font will not be available anymore.

Loading = temporarily available

Installing a font means that it will be automatically added to the fonts table whenever windows is started.

Installing = permanently available

When windows is started up, it automatically checks which fonts are installed and loads them in the fonts table. Having more fonts installed means that it will take longer for windows to startup and also that less resources will be available for programs that you want to run.

Another drawback of having lots of fonts installed is that when you want to select any specific font you need to search through an endless list of fonts before you find the one you want.