[SOLVED] view installed Macintosh fonts in LibreOffice

trentfox · 05-05-2015, 11:42 AM

I have tried installing Macintosh fonts in Ubuntu (14.04) using the following terminal commands as suggested by several websites:

Code:

wget http://dl.dropbox.com/u/26209128/mac_fonts.tar.gz
tar zxvf mac_fonts.tar.gz
sudo mv fonts /usr/share/fonts/
sudo fc-cache -f -v

I can see the fonts in the /usr/share/fonts folder, and clicking on them brings up a window showing their form. However, when using LibreOffice Writer, the new fonts do not show up in the menu; they don't show up in WPS either. I tried copying a few of the fonts, changing ownership to me and then making them read and write for everyone, and then pasting them into an existing folder in usr/share/fonts where other truetype fonts reside that can be seen in LibreOffice. The Times font in particular is important to me because I have a lot of formatted Mac documents that use it. If I select some text and then go to the font window, type in Times and delete the "New Roman" that autocompletes, the Times stays in the window but goes to italics with a message that this font isn't installed. What am I doing wrong and what do I have to do to fix this problem?

DavidMcCann · 05-06-2015, 10:52 AM

Can they be used in a text editor, like Gedit? That will tell you whether there's a general problem with the fonts or just a LibreOffice problem.

What is the extension on the fonts: is it .ttf or something else?

DJ Shaji · 05-06-2015, 07:03 PM

Run this in a terminal:

Code:

sudo fc-cache -f -v

More info here

DJ Shaji · 05-06-2015, 07:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by trentfox

If I select some text and then go to the font window, type in Times and delete the "New Roman" that autocompletes, the Times stays in the window but goes to italics with a message that this font isn't installed. What am I doing wrong and what do I have to do to fix this problem?

This made me smile actually. Thanks for that

The times.ttf font in the package is Times New Roman. You installed the fonts correctly. The times.ttf font is not Times, but Times New Roman.

trentfox · 05-06-2015, 11:37 PM

I'm glad I made you smile DJ Shaji; your answer made me smile because I wondered about that all along. The reason I wanted the actual Times font is that many of the Word Mac documents I created or receive from others are done in Times. Spacing is slightly different from that of Times Roman, so when I open a Word Mac document with LibreOffice, the document doesn't always appear the same. Checking my Mac, I have a Times New Roman.ttf font, and a Times.dfont. Assuming that the Times.dfont file in System/Fonts is the actual Mac Times font, I copied it into Ubuntu and tried converting it with Fondu, but I got a Resource Fork missing error. What was I doing wrong?

DavidMcCann · 05-07-2015, 10:24 AM

You aren't doing anything wrong. This is why I asked about the extension: it seems that dfont files are OS-X only
http://www.prepressure.com/fonts/basics/dfont

There is a program (Windows) to convert
http://peter.upfold.org.uk/projects/dfontsplitter
or an on-line service
http://www.freefontconverter.com/
I haven't tried either, so no guarantees.

trentfox · 05-08-2015, 09:53 AM

Thanks David. I tried both programs; the first one has a Mac version that I used. The on-line wouldn't work; indicated that the file was too large. Dfontsplitter worked, but doesn't give options as to conversion type. What it made were Times .bdf fonts of different sizes, plus .ttf's of Times Bold, Times Bold Italic, Times Italic, and Times Roman. Why not a plain Times ttf - I don't know. At any rate, I copied over the .bdf Times fonts and updated the cache, but Times was still not shown. Other suggestions? Incidentally, the invisible font isn't just in LibreOffice; it is also invisible in gedit.

Update: I just tried copying over the bold and italic Times ttfs. After updating the cache, Times now shows up in the LibreOffice fonts. But when I choose it, I get Times Bold and it doesn't show up as a bold font so I can't unbold it. What I next did was add the Times Roman ttf font that was produced by dontsplitter. After updating the cache, I now can choose Times and I do get an unbolded font. I magnified the image 200x to check for any differences between what was produced by Times and by Times Roman. Despite not having an actual Times non-bolded font, there were definite but subtle differences between the two. I really don't understand this; does it mean that a Times font doesn't actually exist? Can anyone explain?

DavidMcCann · 05-08-2015, 10:51 AM

A bdf font is a bitmap font, not a vector font, so naturally it won't show up in a word processor. Generating that shouldn't have happened.

There will be subtle differences between Times New Roman and Times: one was designed for Microsoft, the other for Apple. It's like Palatino for Monotype/Apple and Palladio for URW/Linux.