Windows 95 (and now 98) has done so much for fonts. Back in the old days on Win 3.0-3.1, if you had more than 20 fonts to load, it took forever. Win 98 loads more than 300 "everyday" fonts quick as a wink.
   Well, that's good and that's bad. What the heck does "Algerian" look like, anyway? How do you find just the right font for the job you're doing? The Zapf Chancery series of fonts are somewhat alike, but different enough so that one can give you one kind of look and another a look that is quite different.
   Worse. Suppose you just bought a CD named "1,500 Great Fonts." What do those "great fonts" look like? You're certainly not going to install them all just to see, and those relatively inexpensive CDs sure as heck don't come with a catalog.
   Please meet Printer's Apprentice (version 7.0). This puppy has it all. It will display fonts on the screen, character sets, custom type and will print out sample sheets in a number of varieties. On top of that, it will print font catalogs so you can see every font (1) you load, (2) on your system or (3) on one of those CD "collections." No, you don't have to install the fonts to see what they look like!
   If you do any sort of commercial typesetting work (or just want to impress your friends), a font catalog is a must. Give 'em 22 pages with 20 fonts on a page and let them choose which one they want! At the same time, you can "private label" your catalog with custom footers and titles and you can even customize the sample text that is printed out. This is impressive.
   So is Printer's Apprentice, which also lets you print out keyboard charts. Why do you care? Simply because it is sure an easy way to find that one special star in the "Stars-4" font you bought and, once having found it, knowing easily and exactly what key to press to get it to show up.
   With the exception of adding a couple of specimin and style sheets, Printer's Apprentice 7.0 adds an entirely new feature, the ability to group fonts and install and uninstall them at will.
   Here you will see we have created several different groups of fonts (you can create as many as you wish) which take merely a mouse-click to install or uninstall.
   This setup is quite different from some other type managers you may have seen or head of. It, like most of Printer's Apprentice, is rather simple and straightforward. There are no huge caches of fonts, no intricate interfaces and no special drivers and the like. Just install the fonts you might need for a job, use 'em, and then uninstall them when you're done. Its that simple.
   We should say that Printer's Apprentice is an extremely robust program. It is not an easy programming feat to manage, print and display several hundred fonts at a time. Printer's Apprentice manages it with ease, its printouts are superior in every respect and it is very, very easy to use.
   If you deal with fonts, even in a small way, Printer's Apprentice is an absolutely must-have program for you.

   Link to the Printer's Apprentice web site.