I can`t change the font for writing

[Michal_Macura]

Version: 2008
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard)
Processor: Intel

In a blank document (as well as in documents created elsewhere) with Cambria as the default font for Body the following happens:
1) Times New Roman always overrides the default font for normal text immediately when I create a new document. So when I start writing, I write in Times New Roman instead of the default font, i.e. Cambria.
2) Selecting other fonts does not work (neither from the Formatting Palette, nor from anywhere else) - the font for typing always goes back to Times New Roman immediately (I even tried disabling Times New Roman in Font Book - without success). The only way I am able to actually change font for text is to type something in Times New Roman, then select what I typed and change the font manually for the selection. However, even when I do that and continue writing on the same line, the font immediately goes back to Times New Roman.
I am sure this must be a bug in the recent version or something caused by incompatibility with Snow Leopard. I would appreciate any help I can get.

 

[Michal_Macura]

I don't think I've made myself clear. I don't need to change default document font or change document template.

My principal complaint is that I can't change the font to type with at all. The only way I can change fonts is to select something that has already been written and then change it to the desired type face.

What I want to do is to select a font (other than Times New Roman, which isn't even the default font) BEFORE typing any text in it.

 

[CyberTaz]

It sounds like you're another victim of what appears to be a Snow Leopard
font scramble. Fortunately you're already familiar with Font Book, so quit
everything else & crank it up. Run its Resolve Duplicates & Validate Fonts
routines then shut down your Mac - not a restart. Wait about 1-2 minutes and
see if the situation improves once you start up again.

If no, it may be necessary to manually clear the font caches so post back
with your results if you need direction on that.

HTH |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Michal_Macura]

Thanks for your suggestions. I ran the Resolve Duplicates and Validate routines even before posting here and I checked again now. But the situation remains the same - Times New Roman stubbornly persists - no matter what font I select, it always reverts back to Times New Roman.

I should probably also say that this problem only affects Word on my machine. I have also Pages installed which works fine.

 

[CyberTaz]

Hello Michal;

Did you also do the full shut down & start up? If not, that may be all you
need to do. If that doesn't resolve it the next step is to Quit all
applications & go into:

User/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008

and delete the files named:

Office Font Cache (12)
Word Font Substitutes

Then do a cold restart & see how it goes (it will probably take a little
longer for Word to start up the first time you launch it).

HTH |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[KIFF]

Hello Michal;

Did you also do the full shut down & start up? If not, that may be all you
need to do. If that doesn't resolve it the next step is to Quit all
applications & go into:

User/Library/Preferences/Microsoft/Office 2008

and delete the files named:

Office Font Cache (12)
Word Font Substitutes

Then do a cold restart & see how it goes (it will probably take a little
longer for Word to start up the first time you launch it).

HTH |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[KIFF]

Thanks to people like you I will not vaporize the planet.

 

[Clive Huggan]

I prostrate myself and offer up the earnest thanks of countless generations
to come, O Lord, for your boundless gifts, including non-vaporization.

CH
====

 

[Michal_Macura]

I would like to bump this question as it hasn't been resolved yet. I still can't select any other font than Times New Roman from any of the text formatting menus. I have reinstalled Office several times and tried to resolve any font related issues. I have OpenOffice and iWork installed on the same computer and both work flawlessly.

It begins to look as if the only real solution will be to install virtual machine software on the Mac and run Office 2007 under Windows.

 

[Rob Schneider]

You say you changed in all the text formatting menus.

to give me some info, do the following:
1. Menu: View/Draft
2. Menu: Word/Preferences, button: View, Set in Window section "style
width area to be 3cm"
3. In document type in some text. In the style width area (to left of
text), see what style name that text going in as.
4. Menu: Format/Style .../. For that style in No. 3 above, Modify the
font to something else, e.g. Arial Black or something obvious (using
the Modify Button). apply that font.
5. Since in draft view, won't see results. So Menu: View/Print Layout
and see if font is as you expect.

--rms

www.rmschneider.com

 

[CyberTaz]

Sorry for taking so long to get back to you but it's been a hectic week.

First of all, though, stop reinstalling Office As you've found, that
does absolutely nothing to resolve an issue of this nature (and most others)
& you also have to reapply the updates each time. Even when reinstalling is
called for it's totally ineffective unless you runt the Remove Office
utility first. Otherwise the files that are responsible never get touched.

In reviewing the conversation I see no reference to a couple of other
possible culprits. We went directly to the Font concerns but apparently were
misled by the symptoms. Let's have a go at this:

Quit all Office apps, then go to;

User/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Office/User Templates

Remove or rename the file: Normal.dotm

Also, go to;

User/Library/Preferences remove the file: com.microsoft.Word.plist

Shut down your Mac then launch Word once you restart. It will take a moment
longer than normal to launch the first time as Word rebuilds those 2 files.

Let us know how you make out.

HTH |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Michal_Macura]

Thank you for your continued effort, Bob. I appreciate it.

Okay, I will stop reinstalling - it's a bad habit I acquired on my PC's. However, I have run the "Remove Office" utility each time.

As for your new recommendations, unfortunately there has been no change, nor sign of improvement after applying them. There are no files whatsoever in User Templates directory by the way.

 

[Tomasz]

I have got the same problem!

The second problem is - please TEST IT!!!

Change default language to Czech or Polish.
Write any word and choose in Menu: Tools - Thesaurus.
All the time it crashes!!!!
I was talking about that one year ago but Microsoft is ignoring it...

 

[Tomasz]

THE SAME - THE SAME!!!!

The problem still exists on my Mac.
I have decided to remove MS Office 2008 until Microsoft will improve their
buggy software...
I have just installed Mellel!
It works perfect - no problems!!!

Sorry - but Microsoft now is the first in ignoring end-users...
The are too big to be interesting in keeping good quality of their software...

Tomasz

 

[CyberTaz]

Sorry to contradict you but what you've written is not even a related
problem, let alone the same one. This thread is relevant to a font change
issue & has absolutely nothing to do with Language or Reference Tools.

If you'd care to submit a NEW message stating all particulars pertaining to
the problem I'm sure someone will be glad to help you with it. Make sure to
include a complete detailed description & be certain to indicate:

Exact version of Word/Office,
Exact version of OS X,
Is this happening in all documents or just one in particular?

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[CyberTaz]

I don't mean to be argumentative - I know what it's like when someone tells
you that what you're experiencing "isn't possible" or "can't be happening" -
but there has to be a Normal.dotm & that's where it would have to be. Word
won't launch without one. If it doesn't find a Normal.dotm on launch it will
create a new one in that location.

Do a Spotlight search for Normal.dotm but you should find it in the folder I
specified: User/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Office/User Templates

If there truly isn't one to be found we have a serious mystery on our hands
& Word must be finding another Normal somewhere... That may be the problem,
so let me know what your Spotlight search turns up. If you have other files
by the name of Normal or Normal.dotm they will probably have to go.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Michal_Macura]

So... I think I have come to the core of the problem.

Two points I want to make:

First, yes, you were right, there was a Normal.dotm template and though Spotlight didn't find it, I have.

And second, although Tomasz' post to this thread was not really constructive, it pointed me in the right direction as I accidentally ran across a font whose name ended in "CE" (for Central Europe) - and switching to it actually worked.

So I tried changing language preferences to English as well as date and currency formats to the U.S. ones, however, without effect. But then I changed keyboard layout to U.S. International and that allowed me to select any of the fonts and write with them as intended.

Now my question is - is there any way of being able to use Czech keyboard AND use other fonts than the ones whose names end in "CE" and Times New Roman?

 

[CyberTaz]

Good work! I'm glad you were able to sort it out ‹ that specific combination
of ingredients isn't one we run across every day but it does explain things.

It also dovetails to the question you now have... The best answer I can give
you is "It's a guessing game unless you know your fonts intimately." this
isn't one of my strongest areas so take what I'm writing with a grain of
salt, but I believe that the issue revolves around whether the font you try
to use contains the necessary characters for the keyboard/language being
used at the time ‹ not all fonts contain every conceivable glyph & most
older fonts are quite limited.

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[Michal_Macura]

The fonts in themselves are fine (i.e. they contain all the necessary characters and work flawlessly in other similar applications) - plus, I can use Czech keyboard to write a line of Times New Roman text in Word and then change it into any font I have installed on my system and it will work (i.e. display all characters correctly).

But, I cannot select a font and then write a line using that font unless it's one or two of the legacy fonts that still use the age-old "CE" nomenclature. The other option is to change my keyboard layout to US which, understandably, prevents me from using crucial diacritics.

Since Word (and Office for Mac) is the only application that, to my knowledge, has this problem, I would consider it either a bug or an outright lack of support for the European languages in question - which puts us back to early 1980s. :-/

I think it's time I opened a new query here describing this specific problem.

 

[Michal_Macura]

God, it was easy. I checked the Czech distributor's website and they give the simple advice of switching off the "Match Font with Keyboard" option in Preferences > Edit. So much for all the hassle about config files. :-D