[Solved] Simplified Chinese characters won't display

[jjmarciniak]

First-time poster here so try to go easy on me.

I have a few spreadsheets in xls format with simplified chinese text in them. I am able to view the characters correctly using a MS Office viewer after downloading the simplified chinese language pack for windows. When I open the files in Calc though, the characters display as the little squares. I have checked the box for "Enabled for Asian Languages" in Language Settings.

Please let me know what I'm doing wrong.

Thanks!

[Robert Tucker]

Does OpenOffice have access to the same fonts as MS Office?

[jjmarciniak]

OpenOffice has 62 fonts, and MS Office has 60.

Also, I've discovered that if a full version of Office is installed on the same PC that OOo is, then both can correctly display the Chinese characters. This doesn't seem to be the case when OOo is installed on the same PC as MS Office viewers, though.

Any ideas?

[RoryOF]

You need to identify the fonts being used and ensure these are available, properly installed, on both computers.

[jjmarciniak]

As far as I can tell, the PC that is correctly displaying the characters doesn't have any special fonts installed. I looked in the font drop-down menu in both applications, as well as the \\Windows\Fonts folder and couldn't find anything resembling Chinese, Simplified Chinese, or any Chinese characters. When I click on the Chinese characters in a spreadsheet, the following characters show up in the font selection drop-down menu: 宋体. After translating them I've come to find out they simply mean "Times New Roman."

[mriosv]

Could be help, Menu/Tools/Options/Language Settings/Languages - Enabled for Asian languages.

[jjmarciniak]

Hmm, yeah I tried that already. On the PC with OOo and just MS Office viewers installed, the characters still don't display correctly whether this feature is enabled or not.

The weird thing is that on the PC that has OOo and full MS Office installed, the "Enabled for Asian Languages" option is deselected, yet the characters still display correctly.

[Hagar Delest]

Can you upload a sample file (see How to attach a document here)?

[jjmarciniak]

Sorry it took so long to post the sample, but here it is.

Thanks for taking a look!

[Hagar Delest]

Works fine for me both in MS Excel 2003 and OOo 3.2.1 on W2k:

MS Excel 2003.png (10.41 KiB) Viewed 43901 times

OOo 3.2.1.png (11.44 KiB) Viewed 43901 times

[jjmarciniak]

It works fine for me as well, but ONLY on a PC that has OOo AND a full version of MS Office installed.

Where I am running into an issue is when trying to view in OOo on a PC that has OOo and the free MS Office "viewer" applications installed (the viewers allow you to see the files but not edit or save them). My goal is to be able to view these characters in OOo on a PC without purchasing and installing MS Office for that PC.

[Robert Tucker]

When I open it on Linux I can see the characters OK. However, it says it is displaying them as DejaVu Sans which can be no more true than Times New Roman because neither contain Chinese characters.

On a computer where they are showing as squares have you tried selecting the squares in the cells (not the complete cell), right-clicking and then selecting a font you know contains Chinese characters? If you don't know which fonts contain Chinese characters, go to Insert>Special Character..., select a font and scroll through it.

[Hagar Delest]

Ubuntu 10.10, interesting:

Ubuntu.png (23.33 KiB) Viewed 43884 times

[Robert Tucker]

The mysteries of OpenOffice font selection! I thought it might be because I had recently reset my user profile and not set default fonts, but I'm not sure that is case. At one point it showed Tahoma which again, as far as I know does not contain Chinese characters and is not installed on my computer. The empty cells show as Calibri which yet again does not, as far as I know, contain Chinese characters and again is not installed on my computer.

[jjmarciniak]

When I open it on Linux I can see the characters OK. However, it says it is displaying them as DejaVu Sans which can be no more true than Times New Roman because neither contain Chinese characters.

On a computer where they are showing as squares have you tried selecting the squares in the cells (not the complete cell), right-clicking and then selecting a font you know contains Chinese characters? If you don't know which fonts contain Chinese characters, go to Insert>Special Character..., select a font and scroll through it.

I've looked through a bunch of fonts, and as far as I know there are no fonts installed on either of the previously mentioned computers that contain any Chinese characters (which doesn't make a whole lot of sense, as the characters are clearly being displayed correctly on the PC with OOo AND full MS Office).

Just to recap, here's the current situation:

PC1 (OpenOffice.org installed; Microsoft Professional 2003 installed): Characters display correctly on both applications. No special fonts installed. Simplified Chinese language pack NOT installed. Asian language support is disabled in Language settings (yet chars still display).

PC2 (OOo installed; Microsoft "viewer" applications installed [not full version of Office]): Characters display correctly only on MS "viewer" applications, and NOT on OOo.

My goal is to have the chars display in OOo on PC2. Sorry if this is redundant but I wanted everything to be 100% clear.

I'm at the point now where I'm leaning toward saying "screw it," and just using a combination of OOo and the MS Office viewers to get the job done. If anyone has any additional insight, I'd appreciate it. Regardless, thanks for all the help I've received thus far!

[Robert Tucker]

I'm no Windows expert but maybe the fonts are embedded in the document and Microsoft viewer can display them. Maybe for some reason Microsoft viewer has access to more fonts on the computer than OpenOffice.

Why don't you install a font you know contains a good set of simplified Chinese characters

http://www.wazu.jp/gallery/Fonts_ChineseSimplified.html

on one of the computers, see that OpenOffice has access to it (you can see it in the drop-down list in the format bar) and then open one of the docs? Select the characters and apply the font to it as I described above if necessary.

[jjmarciniak]

Robert, you are the man!

It took a while for me to find a font on that page that would display ALL of the characters correctly, but I finally found one (simhei.ttf if anyone is wondering).

It was just a matter of installing that font in Windows, and now OOo displays all the Simplified Chinese correctly. Thanks again!

[sorindeb]

hello--I was wondering why WordPad[Windows 7] displays all char correctly without installing extra font but OO etc does not?