character kerning

users
#1

Readers,

The classic text 'lorem ipsum...' shows how kerning of characters in
writer is poor (compared to LaTeX anyway):

Lorem ipsum dolor sit _amet_, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do
eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad
_minim_ _veniam_, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut
aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in
reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla
pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in
culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

If the text above is copied into writer, for a font such as
'liberation serif', examples of poor character kerning are indicated
by the underscore (_) character.

Any way to improve this?

#2

Hi :slight_smile:
I think LaTeX is far more sophisticated for proper professional printing.  My guess would be that commercial publishing houses convert from Writer or Word into LaTeX (or something) and then perhaps reapply formatting.  Kerning is the least of the problems when you look at a document created in Word.  Even so-called Desktop Publishing tools such as Publisher tend to mangle things quite badly.  The quality of documents created with Writer is far far higher but it's still unlikely to compete with proper DTP tools such as LaTeX.

As a work-around it might be worth trying out a few different fonts and see which bothers you the least.  Most people don't notice the other prolific problems created by MSO, let alone kerning or other spacing issues.

It is always possible that someone on this list has some clever way of dealing with kerning or even avoiding it.  I have a feeling there is a way so poking around in the "Format" menu might be useful.  So, i really am hoping we do get a better answer here
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

#3

Not that I know of. If this type of thing is important to you, then a
proper DTP-tool such as Scribus might be more what you need.

Grx HdV

#4

Tom wrote:

I think LaTeX is far more sophisticated for proper professional
printing. My guess would be that commercial publishing houses convert
from Writer or Word into LaTeX (or something) and then perhaps reapply
formatting.

I doubt that. Most professional printing and publishing nowadays is done
from PDFs supplied by the publisher to the printer.

Even so-called Desktop Publishing tools such as Publisher tend to
mangle things quite badly. The quality of documents created with
Writer is far far higher but it's still unlikely to compete with
proper DTP tools such as LaTeX.

But kerning is a function of the font, not of the application. The
kerning in Libre Office is fine, provided the appropriate kerning is
built in to the fonts you use. I have used Libre Office (with various
fonts) in professional publishing. The texts are printed to PDF, the
PDFS are sent to the printers, and the results are perfect.

#5

Since 'liberation serif' is a font that most people outside of the LO/Linux world would not be using, I think you should look into a more common font used by publishing houses. I would look into changing the fonts used and see which one works best for your needs. If you are dealing with a publisher, ask which fonts they use.

I am a font guy, or use to be. I have collected over 14 GB of font files, but I have a core set of fonts that I place on every system that I own. These are the ones I use the most over the years.

Right now, I am reading a hard cover book that has a different font than the paper-back font of the previous version in that series. The kerneling and line spacing is much different than the paperback books. So, with that in mind, you will need to know what the "publication" will look like and use the best font that works for it. If a publisher uses a specific set of fonts, use them. If not, then it is up to you to choose the best font for the document. I sometimes take a paragraph and repeat it over and over again and then make each paragraph a different font. I then take it to friends who help me decide which font works the best for them. After that, I take the final choices and make 2-3 page examples of the text with those fonts at the size and page format that the document will be published. Then which one is best, I use.

Professionals tend to do something like this and then stick with a small core of fonts that work the best for their publications and their different page size.

Since each proportional font is a little different and their kerneling aspect seems to be different from others, you mush go through some process to select the best font for your documents. There are thousands of fonts that look like Times Roman, each just a little different. Once you find and test the fonts, you then keep the best ones for your work. The hard part is the testing of each of them to get the best ones. That is why I suggested asking the publisher[s], if possible, which font[s] they prefer to use, since they would have done such visual font tests before and chosen the best ones.

#6

Is there a "cross-platform" font available, in both sans serif and serif styles?

#7

Are you asking if there is one font that is installed on most Windows, MacOSX, and Linux OS installs? Or are you asking if there is a font set that can be installed on them?

If the first, then not likely, since Windows changes it default installed fonts for every version and last I knew MAC did not have the same font names as Windows.

Not if you want to install a font on Windows, MacOSX, and Linux, well that is different. I do not know if MacOSX will install TTF fonts, or OTF type, but I know that there are font sites where you can find fonts listing both MAC and Windows versions. Linux should be able to install TTF and OTF fonts like Windows, at least my Ubuntu/Linux does.

So, all you have to do is find a font that works on MAC and Windows, and it should work for Linux. Then you just install them on all three platforms.

Well, that said, there is a harder way.
Go through all of the documentation on which fonts are installed with which versions of Windows and MAC. Then look at chart that list which fonts on MAC are the same as the ones on Windows, but have different names of the MAC system. Then go from there.

I do not have MAC, but I have a core set of fonts that I make sure are installed on my Windows andLinux systems.

THEN, if I need to send documents out to others, I embed the fonts in those documents. Most PDF printer drivers, like CUPS-PDF [Linux] and doPDF [Windows] will embed the fonts used into the file so the viewer of the document will see it the way you wanted it to be.

The problem really is not with your systems, but what others have installedon there. If you want your document to work on their systems, with the same font and such, you must embed the fonts in their documents.

LO, well their PDF exportation system was working on embedding all the fonts, instead of just some. I do not know how far along it is but it is not the easiest thing to do.

#8

Since 'liberation serif' is a font that most people outside of the
LO/Linux world would not be using, I think you should look into a more
common font used by publishing houses. I would look into changing the
fonts used and see which one works best for your needs. If you are
dealing with a publisher, ask which fonts they use.

Is there a "cross-platform" font available, in both sans serif and serif
styles?

Are you asking if there is one font that is installed on most Windows,
MacOSX, and Linux OS installs? Or are you asking if there is a font set
that can be installed on them?

Ideally yes, otherwise a font in gnu/linux that has equivalents in the
other systems.

The problem really is not with your systems, but what others have
installedon there. If you want your document to work on their systems,
with the same font and such, you must embed the fonts in their documents.

Understood for pdf, but for odf it would be nice if a document could
be distributed for editing and the font remained unchanged.

#9

AFAIK Arial, Calibri, Times New Roman, and Courier are available for both Linux and Windows. I do not know the equivalents for Mac.

#10

I just went thru all this with Mint. I copied the fonts that are
used in PCLinuxOS and just pasted them into the font
directory in Mint, and now I have all the usual ones, like
Times Roman, which is probably what you want, and a whole
slew of others. Mint has garbage for fonts, out of the box,
and Liberation is an example of that. AAMOF, you can just
*replace* the original fonts directory--you probably don't
want any of the fonts in there anyway.

In both systems, /usr/share/fonts contains the fonts.
Under the fonts directory there are a batch of subdirectories.
Just copy the whole fonts directory to a flash drive, and then
copy the contents back to the fonts directory in the other
system. Or just replace it, as I mentioned.

-doug

#11

There are thousands of fonts that can be found that can be installed on Windows, Linux, and MacOSX, the exact font and not worry about an equivalents. The key would be dealing with fonts that are already installed by others, so they do not need to install a new one.

Here is a free site
http://www.1001freefonts.com/
They show Windows and Mac downloads, but both are TTF font formats.

So if MacOSX used TTF fonts, then the same font file can be used for Windows, Linux, and MacOSX.

#12

FWIW department...

So if MacOSX used TTF fonts, then the same font file can be used for
Windows, Linux, and MacOSX.

I just installed OS X 10.8.2 Mountain Lion on this computer. Fresh barebones install, not an upgrade.

The only software I've installed that may or may not install a collection of fonts is LO.

Font types installed in my Fonts folders are:

  .ttf
  .ttc
  .otf

If you go way back on a Mac, you'll find Postscript fonts before TrueType came into being.

For the purposes of web page design, you can find sites that list the fonts installed as default sets by Windows and Mac, and the sites generally guide you as to what font will be substituted when a specified font does not exist.

HTH