I’d like to be able to enter a font name, and have a list of similar fonts result (preferably in their actual font style).
basically, I receive quite a few files or requests from clients to do something on the web, and am given a font that a) I either don’t have, or b) is not terrible web-friendly. Rather than searching through all my fonts, be nice to have a utility like this.
Some websites where you can buy or download fonts have all their fonts organized into fonts by their style (futuristic, script, monospace, serif, sans serif, etc.). I would just google for “fonts” and see what you get.
You might try searching for the font name at myfonts.com. If the search is successful, you can scroll to the bottom of the returned results and follow the “more fonts like this” link, which will then display a list (and examples) of similar typefaces.
Caution 1: Given the large number of small, independent type design houses and the proliferation of knock-offs (mind you, these two aren’t necessarily related), it is by no means guaranteed that the specific font name you’re looking for will be found in this database. However, if your client is asking for something from one of the major foundries, then your chances are pretty good.
Caution 2: Given the primitive font-rendering capabilities of the web, you might have a hard time trying to match a “web-friendly” font to your clients’ requests.
You may want to try The Font Thing. It’s freeware that can sort fonts by type
I can think of only two ways in which a program could automatically classify fonts (and the second one is probably too hard to be implemented)
The first way would be to group them (as Windows >=98 is capable of) by similarity based on the PANOSE information embedded in the font file, unfortunately not all fonts carry this informatuion though - it has to be explicitly inserted by the font originator.
The second way would be to implement some kind of character recognition, but given the complexity and embellishment of the fonts out there at the moment (not to mention that some faces exhibit great diversity between styles of character within a single font - RansomNote being a good example), I reckon this would be a terribly complex job to do well, akin to developing a really good AI.
Your best bet is (as Ruby says) probably a previewing utility like Font Thing, manually sorting any non-PANOSE fonts yourself.