when I need to use fonts in Inkscape, I see an ocean of fonts that I presume come with Inkscape, and I see only some of my own fonts. Is there a way to get Inkscape to "see" more of my fonts, and for me to trim out the ones that come with Inkscape?

thanks!

lb

linebender wrote:I see an ocean of fonts that I presume come with Inkscape

Inkscape itself does not include any fonts [1] - it only uses those which are installed on your system. The difference between the list of installed fonts you see in Inkscape and in native OS X applications, is due to the fact that Inkscape and other X11-based applications use a different font backend than OS X (ATS, up to Snow Leopard, not sure if it changed in Lion).
The additional fonts are those installed with X11/Xquartz (caveat: not all of those listed work equally well in Inkscape though - for example X11's bitmap fonts).

linebender wrote:and I see only some of my own fonts.

That's due also due to the different fontback ends: font managing tools (Font Book, Font Explorer, etc) for Apple's Type Service do not affect X11's fonts (and vice versa).
Clarification: That's also due to the different font backends used in native applications and those running under X11: font managing tools (Font Book, Font Explorer, etc.) for Apple's Type Service - enable/disable fonts, add additional libraries, create font collections, … - have no effect on what fonts are seen by applications using a different font backend (fontconfig/freetype/pango).

linebender wrote:Is there a way to get Inkscape to "see" more of my fonts

Inkscape currently is configured to load fonts from these directories :

1. 'Library > Fonts' (Local, corresponds to '/Library/Fonts')
2. 'Network > Library > Fonts' (Network, corresponds to '/Network/Library/Fonts')
3. 'Home > Library > Fonts' (User, corresponds to '~/Library/Fonts')
4. '~/.fonts' (hidden folder, used by X11 applications, but not by Mac OS X itself)

(and some more, but those should not bother you nor should you change anything there: /usr/share/fonts, usr/X11/lib/X11/fonts and /opt/local/share/fonts)

If these paths/ libraries are too limited for your purposes, there exists the possibility to create a (hidden) user font configuration file which adds additional directories with fonts. But to do so, you need to resort to the Terminal to create it (Mac OS X doesn't allow to create hidden files easily with the native GUI tools), and - if you add too many fonts - it can slow down the start-up time of Inkscape significantly.

linebender wrote:and for me to trim out the ones that come with Inkscape?

Not easily - you want to exclude those which are installed with X11/Quartz (since none of the fonts come with Inkscape)? It is possible [2], but I would not recommend it since it could possibly break things unexpectedly if some part of the application running under X11 expects some special fonts to be available (e.g. for the GUI part).

--
[1] Packages/archives (DMG, Zip, 7z) and installer (EXE) available for Mac OS X and Windows do not have any fonts bundled nor do they install additional fonts in the system.

[1] by editing a file inside the application bundle (needs to be done manually, and repeated every time you install a newer version from a DMG)

~suv

thank you for the meaty response..I'll prbly live with the unwanted fonts, and add my fonts by the directories you recommended to use.


lb