osx - How to install OS X *.TTC font on Windows? Error: "*.TTC does not appear to be a valid font"

I own both a Mac running OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, and a PC running Windows 7.

On my Mac is a font called "AmericanTypewriter.ttc". I'd like to use that font on my PC, for a specific creative project. I was able to copy the actual font file over to the PC, but when I try to install it into the Windows Fonts folder I get the following error message:

"Cannot install (FONTNAME).ttc - The file '(FONTNAME).ttc' does not appear to be a valid font."

Can *.TTC format font files be installed on Windows? If so, how? Thanks!

UPDATE: I downloaded the source code for a simple ttc2ttf utility (ttc2ttf_AA.tar.gz) found at this Japanese page and compiled it under cygwin via g++. The resulting executable extracted a single file, "AmericanTypewriter.ttf", from the TTC / True Type Collection. (Why have a collection with only one file!?)

However, I still get an error message similar to the one above when I try to install the resulting AmericanTypewriter.ttf onto Windows. I'm stumped again.

p.s. I no longer need this font on Windows, but now I'm determined to figure out why & how-to :-)

Convert ttc to ttf with onlinefontconverter.com (developed by me), like:

This information is based on information that I have gleemed from many different sources, including Adobe's support documents... So any corrections, and changes, are appreciated...

The full document is here... http://www.schollnick.net/wordpress/systems-administration/fonts/

But, What fonts can the Macintosh use?

• .dfont
• Multiple Master (Mac OS X 10.2 and later only)
• OpenType (.otf) *
• TrueType (.ttf) *
• True Type Collection (.ttc)
• Type 1 (PostScript) *

What fonts can Windows use?

• OpenType (.otf)
• TrueType (.ttf)
• Type 1 (PostScript)

Please note, that Windows does not directly support TTC fonts, according to Adobe... So, you could probably use an Font manager to assist with the TTC.. But natively, Windows doesn't support TTC's...

Font Creator allows you to crack open the TTC archive, and extra specific fonts out of it. http://www.high-logic.com/fontcreator/manual/index.html?truetypecollection.html They do have a trial edition, but purchasing it would be $79...

I haven't been able to find a free converter at this point...

Copy the extracted Font to the Macintosh.... Double Click on the font, and font book should open giving you a preview of the font. Choose to install the font.

You should now have the full display of font book, listing all the fonts installed on the system. Find the font you installed, and choose File --> Validate font.

That will give you an report listing any issues with the font. And that report will be able to give you a starting point on what needs to be fixed, and/or if it even can be.

I guess you're just out of luck with this specific font (without converting it).

On a Mac, the font in /Library/Fonts/AmericanTypewriter.ttc is identified as:

$ file /Library/Fonts/AmericanTypewriter.ttc
/Library/Fonts/AmericanTypewriter.ttc: TrueType font collection data

Indeed, the first 4 bytes are the magic number for ttcf:

hexdump -C -n 4 /Library/Fonts/AmericanTypewriter.ttc
00000000  74 74 63 66                                       |ttcf|

So, this surely is a file claiming to use Microsoft's TrueType Collection format. According to Wikipedia:

They were first available in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean versions of Windows, and supported for all regions in Windows 2000 and later.

Mac OS included support of TTC starting with Mac OS 8.5.

And according to Apple:

Mac OS X also works with font formats used by Microsoft Windows. These fonts have all their data in the data fork and do not have the additional resources found in Macintosh fonts.

So: copying to Windows should not yield any data loss, as there is no hidden resource fork to forget. And hence, this should install fine on Windows...

A quick test using Microsoft's Font Validator tool on Windows XP does not show any errors. But a full test shows, among many rendering errors, some things I don't know how to interpret. Note that E2132 and E1607 might indicate the validation tool is outdated, possibly also causing some of the other errors:

• E2008 The PostScript string is not present for both required platforms MS Postscript string is missing, but Mac Postscript string is present
  _{OpenType fonts that include a PostScript name for the font must include names for Platform 1 Encoding 0 (Mac) and Platform 3 Encoding 1 (Microsoft).}

• E2132 The version number is invalid 4
  _{The current version of the OS/2 table is Version 3. Versions zero (0, TrueType rev 1.5), one (1, TrueType rev 1.66), and two (2, OpenType rev 1.2) have been used previously.}

• E2127 The table length does not match the expected length for this version
  _{This error indicates a structural problem with the font. Structural errors may be caused by: a font tool incorrectly generating the font file; a person altering the contents of a valid font file; or some other corruption to the font file. Regenerate the font, or contact the font vendor to obtain a valid version of the font.}

• E1305 Font checksum is incorrect 0x25a37feb
  _{This error indicates a structural problem with the font. Structural errors may be caused by: a font tool incorrectly generating the font file; a person altering the contents of a valid font file; or some other corruption to the font file. Regenerate the font, or contact the font vendor to obtain a valid version of the font.}

• E1303 Non-linear scaling flag (bit 4) is clear, but hdmx table is present
  _{Setting bit 4 of the flags field to clear indicates that the advance width of glyphs will scale linearly because hinting instructions will not alter the advance widths.. The presence of the hdmx table indicates that the advance width of glyphs within this font may be affected by hinting instructions. Set this bit to indicate that the advance widths might not scale linearly.}

• E1410 The xMaxExtent field does not equal the calculated value actual = 1130, calc = 1855
  _{The value of the xMaxExtent field should equal Max(lsb + (xMax - xMin)). This value should be computed using only glyphs that have contours. Glyphs with no contours should be ignored.}

• E1607 The table version was not 0 version = 1, unrecognized version #, no further tests can be performed
  _{Version 0 is the only version of the kern table currently defined. Correct this field using a table editing tool, or a kern editor that creates a valid kern table.}

• E2014 No Microsoft unicode version strings were found
  _{Name strings are required for both platforms. Use a table editing tool to add name strings for Windows.}

Also, it shows many informational messages, like:

• I0040 Not an OpenType table, contents not validated This table type is defined in the Apple TrueType spec.

So, if Microsoft's Font Validator is right, then I assume Apple did a bad job implementing the specifications. (And maybe even on purpose, to stop distribution of the font to Windows?)

I don't think you can. This page claims you can by simply copying it into the Windows Fonts folder:

Copy and paste the font file (fonts typically end with the extension .tty, .ttc or .fon) into the C:\WINDOWS\fonts folder.

(my bold).

However, I'm guessing that this doesn't refer to Mac TTC fonts, but True Type Collections. Mac TTC fonts will be stored in a format that Windows doesn't understand.

This page has a list of font converters including TTConverter that is:

Chris Reed's free utility for Mac users that converts PC TTF format to Mac TrueType and vice versa.

I've just discovered that most of the links for that program are now broken, so are less than useless. You need to find something like this tool for doing the conversion.