The TrueType font is the most common font format used by both Mac OS X and Windows platforms. However, once you convert it to a Windows TrueType font, you can move that over to the Mac device and use it just fine. You have to convert it to a Windows TrueType font, as the Apple TrueType can only be used on Mac devices. You can’t use an Apple TrueType font directly on Windows. macOS Mojave adds support for OpenType-SVG fonts. Alternatively, you can search for the font in the Font Book application and right-click the font and select “Reveal in Finder”. For your info, the system fonts are located at the directory “System/Library/Fonts“. Click the “+” to add a dfont, or simply drag the dfont from the Finder. Choose “to ttf” Choose ttf or any other format you need as a result (more than 200 formats supported).
By default, all my fonts are now Opentype, simply because it is the most up to date format and the most versatile. Maybe some others can chip in if they have ideas. I know this situation is a bit confusing and I am sorry I do not have a clearer answer. If you open a font in a glyph editor, you could analyse the curves to detect whether they are Bezier (Postscript) or Quadratic (TrueType), but this seems a bit of a complicated method…
One added extra value of Opentype fonts is that they are multiplatform, so they will work both on PC and Mac. So if you can open, or atleast preview the glyphs included in a font, if there is a large character set, then you would know it is an Opentype font, whether OTF (Postscript Opentype) or TTF (TrueType Opentype). TrueType fonts are limited to the basic 243 glyphs, so any extra features would have to be provided as separate fonts. If all you need is to access the basic forms, so lowercase, capitals, basic Latin accents, numerals, etc, then an Opentype or TrueType font should do the job fine.These features are not supported by the TrueType format. So if, when you are using a font, they have these features, then you know you are using an Opentype font. So adding extra language support, adding features like Ligatures, alternates or Swash, etc. For me, I create Opentype fonts (OTF or TTF) to be able to use the extra features.I would simply try to break down what you are trying to do, this would be my approach: I hope this is not too confusing, as a designer, I still find the whole quite very frustrating!Īs far as I know, I do not think it is possible to know if your TTF is actually an Opentype TTF or just a TTF file. So some of my Opentype fonts, are only available in TTF format… You need to therefore check if your TTF is actually an Opentype TTF… The Postscript formats are the ones using the OTF extension. For example, I have found my more complex typefaces often fail in the Postscript language, but work well as TrueTypes.Īll this to say, that nowadays, you can get a TTF font that is actually a TrueType Opentype. They offer different ways of drawing the curves found in letters, and each format has certain advantages. With the format, the curves of the actual letters maybe drawn with 2 types of curves, Postscript, or TrueType. The issue becomes more complicated with Opentype as that simply refers to the general packaging, if I can describe it as such. TTF (TrueType fonts) was the format that preceded OTF (OpenType fonts) and was indeed limited by character sets and such.
I just wanted to add a bit of extra info, I hope to not make it too confusing… The above comments seem correct, but, it can actually be a bit more complicated…