You shouldn’t feel as if you have to have explanations for the type designer. I wouldn’t. I would guess it is a naming issue. But, really, the type designer should be able to explain it to you. No?

It sounds like the font is not set up with reg/bold/italic/bold italic linkings. I believe this is the only way that InDesign would know which font to use for bold or italic when it imports the Word doc. It has been common practice for some foundries to set up each font in a family as its own separate one-font family in order to overcome Windows/Mac name compatibility issues. Perhaps this is the case with the new fonts?

Thanks for the suggestions. I’ve spoken with the designer and indeed, the font was not set up with the linkings. It’s a new still-in-development face, so that simply hadn’t been done yet.

(Thanks also for moving this topic — I wasn’t sure whether it belonged in Build as it was more an end-user question — I figured someone would move it if necessary.)

They should be applying styles instead manual formatting, but the buttons are so much more convenient there probably isn’t much hope for that.
One thing you could do while waiting for the fix is to define two character styles (MyItalicStyle and MyBoldStyle ), each using the correct font, and then run this macro (ConvertToStyles) once on each Word document.

Private Sub doConvertToStyle(isItalic As Boolean)
With Selection.Find
.ClearFormatting
.Replacement.ClearFormatting
If isItalic Then
.Font.Italic = True
.Replacement.Style = ActiveDocument.Styles(“MyItalicStyle”)
Else
.Font.Bold = True
.Replacement.Style = ActiveDocument.Styles(“MyBoldStyle”)
End If
.Text = “”
.Replacement.Text = “”
.Forward = True
.Wrap = wdFindContinue
.Format = True
.MatchCase = False
.MatchWholeWord = False
.MatchByte = False
.MatchAllWordForms = False
.MatchSoundsLike = False
.MatchWildcards = False
.MatchFuzzy = False
.Execute Replace:=wdReplaceAll
End With
End Sub

Sub ConvertToStyles()
doConvertToStyle True
doConvertToStyle False
End Sub

I forgot to say...
Those are Word macros. To use them, add them to your Normal.dot.

> Because they’re not particularly savvy, these editors use the “faux” bold and italic buttons regularly, instead of changing the typeface to the correct italic or bold variant.

On Windows this should not be a problem - the [B] and [I] buttons will link to the true bold or italic fonts if they exist and and if they are correctly named. On the Mac is this still a problem? I would have thought this would have been fixed a long time ago.

Cheers, Si

It’s not a problem on the Mac either, if the fonts are set up correctly. I don’t think it ever has been a problem, except with fonts that don’t have style links or have incomplete links (italics, but no bold, for example). The style linking information is stored in the FOND resource (in the font “suitcase”) in both Type 1 and TrueType fonts.

Actually, this isn’t a problem on Mac either, as long as the fonts are built to support style links, and the bold and italic fonts are present. Calling the initial use of this faux bold and italic is incorrect - faux bold and italic is what happens when the fonts are either not present or not linked. Simply using the buttons is just fine as long as the fonts are linked and present (and even necessary if the person is using Word on Windows, or if the files might be taken to the Windows version of Word).

Jinx! :-)

By the way, I think it is really neat the way InDesign toggles between the appropriate fonts when you do command-shift-B or command-shift-I as if you selected the fonts from the font menu.

Hello to all,

Thanks for the illuminating discussion...I was just having this exact problem and found this thread.

I have designed identities for some small companies and created templates for them in Word that have this exact problem: the fonts in use don’t have correct FOND resource style linking information to allow autosubstitution in Word (thanks for the tip Mark...)

For example, I used Scala and Scala Sans in an identity just a few months ago and had to resort to creating paragraph styles in the Normal.dot templates (along with simple keyboard shortcuts and a training session with the employees on how to use them!):

So, the question is: when using commercial typefaces in projects, how can designers correct this? Can font programmers be hired to “correct” the lack of style linking information in these fonts and save new versions of the font files? Or, would that be breaking the legal terms of use?.....

Why would reputable foundries not include this information in their faces’ FOND resource areas?!?

It really is a problem when the end user is the average corporate worker. They simply won’t bother with complex formatting rules, no matter how simple you try to make it for them....if the bold and italic buttons don’t work in Word, forget it. I said the words “Paragraph Style” to them in the above-mentioned training session, and they looked at me like I had a 10-pound goiter.

Any suggestions for dealing with this in the future?
(and thanks Tom for the macro code.....very handy, but again, I leave little hope that end users of office templates will actually ever run it!....)