I want to change the default font from Times New Roman for a user. However, I’m aware that some fonts are not available on other systems. What would be best practise here and how do document writers plan for the target systems their documents will be written on?
What jiero suggests is basically correct, either use tired (old) fonts or install free fonts on the systems you intend to edit documents on.
LibreOffice 4.0 ships four new open-source font families: Open Sans (Ascender), PT Serif (ParaType), Source Code Pro and Source Sans Pro (Adobe). [source].
Those four fonts would be a decent place to start. Microsoft has stopped distributing their pack of TrueType Core Fonts for the Web, however you can still obtain them (via SourceForge or Nick Shank’s website) for Windows, MacOS, GNU/Linux, BSD, etc.
If you are using a complex script (abjad, abugida, logograph, etc.) I highly recommend making use of the open-source SIL fonts. Gentium is a very good Times New Roman replacement.
Note that different operating systems support different technologies (OpenType, AAT, Graphite) for advanced font features. The level of support in LibreOffice for some of these features varies according to platform.
Thanks, that helps. I think I’ll leave her as she is for the time being. And you’re right - Gentium is a great improvement.
Stick with LibreOffice and use the fonts come with LibreOffice on any systems; use web fonts.
Someone need to maintain a pack of Libre-Font for all system, with customized font suggestion to real-world usage…
The final solution will be when ODF document specification will be finished and implemented in LibreOffice - to embed fonts used in document.