How to change the default font used in Index and tables

English
#1

How to change the default font used in Index and tables? For example I am using the unicode font Meera as the default font font for all my documents. The system default font is set to Meera (in system settings). But when I insert Index and tables in Libre writer, the default font for the same is “Times New Roman”! I don’t know where that selection comes from, because I haven’t set such an option anywhere in LO or OS. After permitting modifying the index and tables entry, I change the font to the one of my liking. But then the page numbers change. And when I update the index and tables just to fix those page numbers writer changes the font used for Index and tables to Times New Roman again! The vicious circle repeats. (Why they are disturbing user space, and forcefully changing user selections, I wonder. Don’t break user space, isn’t that a primary rule)
Anyway my problem is simple - I need a way to fix the default font used by Index and Tables.

Note: Libre Office is improving a lot, and even with a few issues here and there it is an excellent replacement for MS Office. Thanks for the good work.

#2

The easiest way to do this is Tools>Options, LibreOffice Writer>Basic Fonts (Western).

You will find there several settings controlling families of styles.

  • Default: for all styles (contexts) bot overridden by the others
  • Heading: for all Heading n paragraph styles (chapter headings) and Title + Subtitle (usually formatting book title and subtitle)
  • Index: for all Contents n paragraph styles (TOC) and those for alphabetical index, list of figures, …, bibliography
  • List: for all paragraphs styled List n or Numbering n which are intended for lists, but you must assign the styles manually to your list items
  • Caption: for all paragraph styles intended to caption figures, images, tables, …

If you are in multiple script context (entering RTL or Asian text), you have additional Basic Fonts (xxx) settings.

In case you are not yet familiar with styles, I recommend you read the Writer Guide.

#3

// The easiest way to do this is Tools >Options , LibreOffice Writer >Basic Fonts (Western).// I have set all of them to the unicode font Meera. But the Index and Tables is getting displayed in Times New Roman and NOT Meera! The default font used by Libre Writer seems to be Liberation Serif. And I don’t know from where this Time New Roman is coming from. May be I should clarify a bit more - Once the Index and tables is inserted the ‘Protected against manual changes’ check box gets ticked by default, and the font selection box displays the font as Meera even though it is not Meera. And when I right click and select ‘Edit Index’ and uncheck the ‘Protect against manual changes’ text box, and then again click the index and tables, the font drop down box shows the font (may be correctly) as Times New Roman. I have to select the Index and Tables and change the font to Meera to make it Meera. And then the whole page numbers becomes wrong! And in the current scenario I will have to edit all the page numbers in Index and Tables manually. :frowning:

#5

I suspect some kind of direct formatting which overrides the configuration settings. Or you are in multi-script context. Please attach a sample file. Make sure the problem is still present. Since I have no Meera font, where can it be downloaded?

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#6

//I suspect some kind of direct formatting which overrides the configuration settings. // I have no idea. I am not using Times New Roman anywhere. //Or you are in multi-script context. // That is true - the document uses Malayalam script and English script (But as far as I know I am not using Times New Roman script anywhere in that document) //Please attach a sample file. // Sure I will. //Since I have no Meera font, where can it be downloaded?// Link: Meera Malayalam Font - Free Download From Malayalam Unicode

#7

sample.docx (17.2 KB)
Sample file for the reported Tables and index font issue.

#9

Please, don’t save DOCX.
With LibreOffice always save in ODT.

#10

I prefer docx, because that helps me to open or use this document in windows/word as well, if required. Anyway I am not using that as of now since I am using LO now in a LMDE5 (Linux Mint Debian Edition) machine. But I checked this issue with odf files too. The exact same issue is present there too. So it is not an issue related to file saving format I think.

#11

Can changing some parameter in Toos->Options->LibreOffice->Advanced->Open Expert Configuration, solve this problem for me?

#12

Saving .docx is the most reliable and predictable way to have problems because M$ DOCX format doesn’t include all features of ODT (and reciprocally).

In particular, you can’t save the multi-script status of your text, which you have not enabled. So first:

  • Tools>Options, Language Settings>Languages
  • enable Complex Text Layout and select Malayalam from the drop-down menu


This will give you access to Basic Fonts (CTL) to configure fonts for Malayalam. Without enabling CTL, Writer is not aware of Malayalam specificities and uses default settings when meeting Malayalam.

You have direct formatting approximately every time you want to deviate from paragraph style. This may be a consequence of .docx because Word has no notion of character styles (in fact it knows of paragraph styles, full stop). Direct formatting is also imposed on the TOC. Don’t do that, customise the Contents n styles.

Since CTL was not enabled, your TOC is effectively Times New Roman (default!).

How to fix

  • save exclusively .odt otherwise you won’t be able to use (and keep) Writer-specifics features like multi-script documents
  • use styles exclusively without direct formatting because direct formatting always plays nasty tricks on your back (and this is of utmost importance in multi-script context)
  • unfortunately, since you saved .docx, the conversion process has already damaged your document (structurally and style-wise, though you don’t see it visually) beyond repair; so start with a new blank document, copy your present text and paste it unformatted to avoid to import all docx pollutants; after that apply styles
  • and, as always, avoid direct formatting even if you think this is “intuitive”
2 Likes
#13

First of all thanks for your excellent guidance. // Saving .docx is the most reliable and predictable way to have problems because M$ DOCX format doesn’t include all features of ODT (and reciprocally).// Ok. I realize that odt is a better format and will keep this in mind for the future. // * unfortunately, since you saved .docx, the conversion process has already damaged your document (structurally and style-wise, though you don’t see it visually) beyond repair; so start with a new blank document, copy your present text and paste it unformatted to avoid to import all docx pollutants; after that apply styles// NOP! Because it is a 700 page document and I don’t want to do the whole formatting again just for the sake of Index and Tables. But your advice is very much helpful for me I do realize. For now as you have suggested - 1) I just enabled CTL 2) Set the complex langugae/family for Default paragraph style and Contents 1 as “Malayalam/Meera” 3) Kept the document format as docx itself. And in Edit Index->Entities->Character style ->Default Character Font->Edit->Font changed the Language/Family to Malayalam/Meera. Deleted the whole TOC and recreated it again. And Voila! I got the required result - i.e. whole TOC with Meera font without problem! (At least visibly. There could be invisible problems, but I don’t care about them as of now) Thanks! Thanks a lot! Your reply helped a lot! Hugs. Note: I know that may be it is not the right solution. But it worked.

#15

Just an unrelated doubt comes to mind. What about a document which uses 3 or more script instead of two? For example a document that uses Malaylam, English and Devanagari. Western/Complex choice allows only two scripts - right? What if there is a third script present?

#17

The document opens fine, and the font for the entire document seems to be Meera.

#18

It will work fine. The important factor is CTL. What you select in CTL configuration is the default language. You can have as many languages in a single document as you like. All you have to do is to tag your sequences (paragraphs or groups of words) with ad hoc styles (paragraph for a whole paragraph or character for an alien sequence in a paragraph).
As far as I know, Malayalam and Devanagari belong in the same linguistic group, therefore the same handling in Writer. This is the same for an English+French+Spanish document. All three languages are in the Western group and are handled the same.

But, this may not work if you save .docx because this needs translation/conversion into different founding primitives. And when you’re back in Writer, you have the reverse translation, making things worse by cumulative effects. The golden rule with any application is: work and save in native format (.odt for LO Writer, .docx for M$ Word).

Wrong! Because you must do it for every entry element of the structure line at every level. In addition, many elements have no character style by default; you must create one or use an existing one in an unconventional manner (possibly causing later formatting problems).

The easiest and correct way is to change the language in paragraph styles Contents n. You do it once and it is effective on all structure elements.

But, once again, it may not be persistent because you save .docx.

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#19

Loved your answer. Thanks. Just one factual correction -

English+French+Spanish are different languages which uses the same Latin script. But Malayalam and Devanagari are different scripts. Languages such as Sanskrit, Hindi etc are written using Devanagari script. Only Malayalam language is written using Malayalam script.

#4

Open the styles list and make sure that 1) the font in Default paragraph style is set to Meera and 2) the font in Contents 1 is set to Meera as well. If the second isn’t, you apparently at some point in time changed the font for Index or derived styles. The rule for inheriting properties from styles is that a style inherits everything unless a property gets modified explicitly. Once that has been done, modifying the base style, like Default paragraph style, won’t undo the change in the derived style.

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#8

Yes, both of them are set to Meera. But still the problem persists.

#14

In that case, either the document or your user profile is corrupted. To find out which is the case, start a new document in Writer, copy some text from your original document and paste as unformatted text in the new document (so you have something to work with that isn’t affected by the corruption, then try to build a TOC and see if the problem persists. If it doesn’t, your original document is corrupted, if it does, it’s most likely time to reset your user profile. See LibreOffice user profile - The Document Foundation Wiki for help. Note: you rename the old profile, so your user settings are safe, and you can later copy them from the old profile to the new one. Do that when LibreOffice is not running.

1 Like
#16

Thanks. Problem resolved based on guidance by ajlittoz. Thanks once again.

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