Are the Office 2008 fonts required

[netnothing]

I've heard people having problems with the fonts Office 2008 installs.

Can I get an answer on whether these fonts are required or not?

Currently, I have installed Office 2008 however, I chose not to install the Office Fonts. Do I need them?

If I do, can I install them without reinstalling all of Office?

-k

 

[CyberTaz]

Hi -k -

See the interjections below:

I've heard people having problems with the fonts Office 2008 installs.

Exactly what problems are those? There hasn't been anything here to that
effect - although some issues may possibly be "font-related". That doesn't
mean that there are problems with the fonts themselves

Can I get an answer on whether these fonts are required or not?

Apparently not, since your next statement suggests that you haven't
installed them... and if they were *required* I doubt the option to not
install would have been offered

Currently, I have installed Office 2008 however, I chose not to install
the Office Fonts. Do I need them?

That's a totally different question: If you expect to receive docs from
other users of Office 2007/2008 you should expect that the new fonts will be
used. If you don't have the fonts installed substitution will have to be
made & the result may not be to your liking.

If I do, can I install them without reinstalling all of Office?

I'm certain that you can but can't say "how" for sure as I haven't installed
the retail package as yet. My guess would be to run the installer again but
opt to install nothing but the fonts. It may also be possible to drag 'n'
drop from the install disk - won't know until I crack the seal.

 

[netnothing]

First, do a Google search on 'Office 2008 font issues'. I'll even help out, here's the link:

 

I chose not to install them because of these reports. When a majority of the solutions for these problems are 'disable the fonts Office installs', I chose to not even bother installing them.

Maybe I should have phrased my question better....

If I don't install the Office 2008 fonts, can I expect to have ongoing issues with the program functioning? Do the apps themselves need to fonts to work correctly?

Like just about any other App in the world, I realize that if someone sends me a document with fonts I don't have, my system won't display them.

Your other statement about other users of 2007/2008 does answer a question. Obviously Microsoft has chosen to use new default fonts in these apps. So I guess I should make sure at least the default fonts are installed.

-k

 

[netnothing]

I have run the installer and installed just the office fonts.

I then went into Font Book and resolved and duplicates.

So you can install the fonts themselves without re-installing office.

-k

 

[John McGhie]

Yeah, you can

Personally, I WOULD/DID install the Office fonts, because they are much
updated and a lot nicer than many other fonts around. Microsoft actually
put some work into these, the typography is much improved.

They also provide a much wider range of characters than the ones they
replace.

And when you get into Themes, they won't work "properly" unless the Office
fonts are available.

The issues we are seeing with fonts tend to be with fonts from other
manufacturers, and they usually turn out to be issues with people using a
very large number of fonts, several font managers, and dynamically
enabling/disabling fonts that are scattered across multiple font folders.

Office 2008 works best if all of your fonts are in the System font folder.

But if you really do not like the new fonts, you don't have to have them.
They are nice, but not essential.

I would caution you not to disable the Chinese/Japanese fonts. These are
required to produce certain special characters (and I can't remember which
ones).

Hope this helps

I have run the installer and installed just the office fonts.

I then went into Font Book and resolved and duplicates.

So you can install the fonts themselves without re-installing office.

-k

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John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
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Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[netnothing]

John,

Thank you for the excellent reply.

I ended up installing the fonts and thus far haven't had any issues.

-k

 

[CyberTaz]

Thanks for the feedback & confirmation

In addition to the points made by John, many of the font issues you read
about also revolve around corrupt font caches. Most of those problems were
just lying there waiting to happen... it's just that the installation of
2008 with the new fonts may have agitated those sleeping dogs. This is
especially common where users allow their systems to run 24/7/365 - which
seems to be a growing trend.

BTW - I hope you didn't take my attempted levity as dismissive or otherwise
negative in any way. I was simply trying to bring the matter into proper
perspective.I'm glad all is working out for you & sincerely expect it will
continue.