Shortcut to PDF garbled symbols

[Stefanmz7]

`Hi! I have a shortcut in macOS 26 beta 1(dev beta) that makes PDF from doc and docx but the resulting PDFs are garbled symbols. Why? Here it is:

 

[Slartibart]

Indicates a font missing/font encoding problem. Does this affect any PDF you create from doc/docx? doc/docx do not embed the font used. If you open such doc/docx directly, is there a notification related to the fonts used? if you do not have Word installed, you can check e.g., withApple’s Pages.

Potential (partly) fix:

• Use Onyx and clean the font caches.
• Open Fontbook, check whether you have the right fonts installed. while having it open, check for and resolve duplicate fonts. if you have the any fonts of the Noto family installed, deactivate these.

Then try again to export.

 

[Stefanmz7]

ok thank you! I actually created the doc/docx in pages. (Save as docx). And the font was Helvetica. Why should I deactivate Noto fonts? Are they a problem, do they cause problems? I am just curious, I have no idea which fonts these are otherwise.

 

[Slartibart]

Is there a reason not to directly convert .pages to PDF? To answer your question: Some versions of Noto can cause problems in displaying websites in Safari or generating PDFs. If you, or a program you use, rely on these fonts get the latest version of the Noto fonts here.

Also duplicates of different versions of a font can cause additionally all kinds of problems.

 

[Stefanmz7]

Well thank you! That is very interesting and informative! How do I know if anything is using the Noto fonts? Is there a way? Also I will check for duplicate fonts. The reason why not .pages is because I decided to make an automation that whenever I need to download some document and it happens to be Word, make a pdf so I can send it to someone without worrying about fonts and stuff and just in case, in general. And I made it an automation so I don't have to think about it. I don't really need to convert pages but honestly I might include that in the automation not a bad idea. So I can just save the document and have a pdf if I need to send it to a non Apple user. Thanks a lot!

 

[Slartibart]

Well, from your description it might be that you might not have for example Microsoft’s default office fonts on your Mac installed - while e.g., Word doesn’t embed the fonts, it is referencing them in the document and on your Mac a substitute font is used when opening the file. Same for other not installed fonts in a .doc/docx - which can effect layout and appearance quite a bit.

 

[Stefanmz7]

yeah I don't want to install word, Pages opens the documents and they look fine so the fonts should be supported, or why can't it substitute the font before the conversion if it does it when you open the document? Also I checked my fonts no duplicates but I have Noto fonts, one of them is disabled but the others aren't and they are locked meaning maybe system fonts? When I go to update them here https://fonts.google.com/noto/use#how-are-noto-fonts-organized
I press font selector there in the get noto fonts section and it brings me to a GitHub page where I am very confused. How do I update them?

 

[kinga]

This might be a bug with how the Shortcut handles .doc/.docx in the beta. Try converting to PDF using Word directly or exporting to .rtf first, then PDF.

 

[Slartibart]

is it garbled when you open said .doc(x) in Pages and export from there?

 

[Stefanmz7]

no it is not. I think it might actually be a bug in the beta, I am on the dev beta 1 so it is very possible. Maybe I should report it to Apple through feedback. In the meantime maybe I will do this

 

[Stefanmz7]

This might be a bug with how the Shortcut handles .doc/.docx in the beta. Try converting to PDF using Word directly or exporting to .rtf first, then PDF.