fontology

(XEROX PARC) The body of knowledge dealing with the

construction and use of new fonts (e.g. for window systems

and typesetting software). It has been said that fontology

recapitulates file-ogeny.

Unfortunately, this reference to the embryological dictum

that "Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" is not merely a joke.

On the Macintosh, for example, System 7 has to go through

contortions to compensate for an earlier design error that

created a whole different set of abstractions for fonts

parallel to "files" and "folders" - ESR

[Jargon File]

(1994-12-01)