Clear Mac OS X Font Caches

clear-font-cache.md

Quick Guide

sudo atsutil databases -remove

atsutil server -shutdown

atsutil server -ping

Extended Guide

from http://doc.extensis.com/Font-Management-in-OSX-Best-Practices-Guide.pdf

Cleaning the system font cache

OS X includes a command line utility for cleaning the system font cache. To use the utility, you need to log in with an administrator account.

1. Close all applications. (Important!)
2. Start Terminal (located in the Utilities folder; press Command-Shift-U to open this folder).
3. Type sudo atsutil databases -remove and press Return.
4. Type your password at the prompt (no characters will echo back to the screen).
5. When the process is complete, type exit to end your command line session, choose File > Quit to exit Terminal, then restart your Macintosh.

Cleaning Adobe font caches

If your font display problems are limited to Adobe applications, it may be due to a corrupt Adobe-specific font cache.

The different versions of Adobe applications create font caches with various names in several locations. Rather than exhaustively list the possible names and locations for Adobe font caches, it is simpler to use the Find feature of the Mac OS X Finder to locate these files for you, then delete them.

The following steps set up the Finder so you can locate files in System folders that are not normally included in Find operations.

1. In the Finder, press Command-N to open a new window.
2. Press Command-F.
3. Click the pop-up menu that shows Kind and choose Other.
4. Scroll down the list of search attributes to System files, check the box in the In Menu column, and click OK.

These steps add the System files option to the pop-up search menu. You will only need to perform these steps once; after this, the System files option will always be in the pop-up menu.

To remove Adobe font caches:

1. Quit all Adobe applications.
2. Open a new Finder window.
3. Press Command-F.
4. Click This Mac in the Search bar.
5. Choose System files from the first pop-up menu, then choose Are included from the second pop-up menu.
6. Click the + button at the end of the “System files are included” criterion.
7. Choose Name from the first pop-up menu, then choose contains from the second pop-up menu, then type fnt into the field.
8. Click the + button at the end of the “Name contains fnt” criterion.
9. Choose Name from the first pop-up menu, then choose ends with from the second pop-up menu, then type .lst into the field. Tip: Click Save in the Search bar to quickly perform this search again.
10. When the search is complete, select the files in the list whose name start with Acro, Adobe, and Illustrator and move them to the Trash, then empty the Trash.

The next time you open the a selected Adobe application, it will automatically create new clean copies of the font cache files.

Microsoft Office font cache

If Microsoft Office applications crash or freeze, display font corruption warnings, run slowly, or if you have font menu problems, then you may need to manually clear the Office font cache.

1. Close all Microsoft Office applications.
2. Depending upon your version of Office, remove the following files:

• ~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office Font Cache (11)
• ~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008/Office Font Cache (12)
• ~/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2011/Office Font Cache

3. Open the affected Office application.

Apple iWork font cache

If one of the applications in Apple’s iWork suite is crashing after picking a template or clicking in an editable field, clearing the iWork font cache can help.

1. Close all iWork applications.
2. Move the following file to the Trash:

• ~/Library/Caches/com.apple.iwork.fonts

3. Open the affected iWork application.