Fonts help!

Question

Level 1

12 points

Fonts help!

I recently received a word doc created on PC. The original document had a Hindi Font "Shusha" which is not on my iMac. I tried replacing this with "Devnagri", it shows up on my font book, but it did not show up in the fonts available in MS Word.
I have two questions.

1. How do I install new fonts on my iMac.
2. How do I get "Devnagri" to work with MSword ?

I am new to Mac so need a little help figuring this out.

Imac, Mac OS X (10.5.8), 2.66 GHz Intel core 2 duo, 2GB RAM

Posted on Jan 22, 2010 4:44 AM

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Answer 1

Simon-UK-

Level 4

3,605 points

Jan 22, 2010 5:32 AM in response to Madinmumbai

If it's installed and showing in your Font Book you should have access to it from within any application. Have you tried installing other fonts to see if they show up?

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Answer 2

Madinmumbai Author

Level 1

12 points

Jan 22, 2010 5:46 AM in response to Simon-UK-

They are installed and showup in the Font Book. App. But don't work in TextEdit or in Ms Word.
No, I have not tried installing other fonts.

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Answer 3

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

122,210 points

Jan 22, 2010 5:48 AM in response to Madinmumbai

2. How do I get "Devnagri" to work with MSword ?

MS Word for Mac does not support Devanagari (or any Indic language).

You will need to use another app, like TextEdit, Pages, OpenOffice, Nisus Writer.

You do not need to download any fonts -- there is only one that works and it is already on your machine (Devanagari MT).

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Answer 4

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

122,210 points

Jan 22, 2010 6:16 AM in response to Madinmumbai

But don't work in TextEdit

In order to type in Devanagari in TextEdit (or any app) you must first go to system preferences/language & text/input sources and check the box for the Devanagari keyboard layout (plus the box for Show Input Menu in Finder). Then you go to the "flag" menu at the top right of the Finder and select Devanagari. Then type.

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Answer 5

Madinmumbai Author

Level 1

12 points

Jan 22, 2010 6:37 AM in response to Tom Gewecke

Thanks for that!

Really surprised that other Hindi fonts aren't useable on Mac. As well as very sad to have invested in MS Word for Mac, not for the first time, and am now looking for other options.

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Answer 6

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

122,210 points

Jan 22, 2010 8:30 AM in response to Madinmumbai

Really surprised that other Hindi fonts aren't useable on Mac.

Mac and Windows use different technologies for complex scripts like Hindi. Windows Hindi fonts can be used with OpenOffice 2/X11 (that's an older version of OpenOffice 3) plus I think some of the most recent Adobe apps.

http://www.thomasphinney.com/2009/01/adobe-world-ready-composer/

Another option for using Windows fonts is via Linux, which is easy to add to OS X:

http://m10lmac.blogspot.com/2009/12/using-linux-for-language-input.html

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Answer 7

Madinmumbai Author

Level 1

12 points

Jan 22, 2010 8:40 AM in response to Tom Gewecke

Another thing that I have not been able to do is select a certain text and change the font. In PC that is easy to do because I know how to do it. How does one do that in Mac? I am trying to read the doc sent to me in Hindi. In TextEdit I am able to see the Hindi language text converted to Roman(Default font). When I select it and change to Devnagri I still get to see the Roman version. Is it possible to view selections in different fonts?

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Answer 8

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

122,210 points

Jan 22, 2010 8:46 AM in response to Madinmumbai

In TextEdit I am able to see the Hindi language text converted to Roman(Default font).

Do you mean you are not actually seeing Devanagari script but Latin instead? If so, you could have an encoding problem (OS X only does Unicode Hindi). No easy font change can fix that.

Try opening the doc with OpenOffice, which is a free word clone.

If you like, send me a copy of your doc (tom at bluesky dot org) and I will see if I can figure out the problem.

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Answer 9

Madinmumbai Author

Level 1

12 points

Jan 22, 2010 10:12 PM in response to Tom Gewecke

"Do you mean you are not actually seeing Devanagari script but Latin instead? If so, you could have an encoding problem (OS X only does Unicode Hindi). No easy font change can fix that. "

Yes I am seeing Latin instead. I can select other fonts but with Devangari nothing happens. What does 'encoding problem' mean? Is it my machine or is it the source?

i will send the document to you if nothing else works. Thanks.

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Answer 10

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

122,210 points

Jan 23, 2010 5:19 AM in response to Madinmumbai

Yes I am seeing Latin instead. I can select other fonts but with Devangari nothing happens. What does 'encoding problem' mean? Is it my machine or is it the source?

If you do not see Devanagari when you have selected the text and switched the font in TextEdit or OpenOffice to the Devanagari MT provided with OS X, then your source could be some non-standard legacy encoding.

In any case, it is hard to tell what the problem might be without seeing the file.

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Answer 11

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

122,210 points

Jan 23, 2010 5:34 AM in response to Madinmumbai

PS It looks like the Shusha font is totally non-standard, it maps Devanagari to Latin. You can download it from various places like here:

http://www.abhivyakti-hindi.org/abhi/hindishusha_fonts_dlhelp.htm

and put it in your Home/Library/Fonts and see if it works with your document. It might or it might not work with OS X or MS Word or TextEdit or OpenOffice. The encoding standard expected by all modern machines and apps is Unicode, where no other script is mapped to Latin and you do not need to install custom fonts.

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Answer 12

Madinmumbai Author

Level 1

12 points

Jan 23, 2010 9:19 PM in response to Tom Gewecke

Thanks Tom!

Susha installed and it works just fine with MS Word and TextEdit.

thanks for all the help!

cheers,

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Answer 13

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

122,210 points

Jan 24, 2010 5:53 AM in response to Madinmumbai

Susha installed and it works just fine with MS Word and TextEdit.

Good news!

If at all possible I would recommend moving whatever work you are doing in that custom encoding to Unicode instead, to avoid it becoming unreadable sometime in the future.

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