GIMP Version: 2.10.24
Operating System: Linux
OS Version: Linux Mint 20.1 Cinnamon (Kernel 5.4.0-58)
GIMP Experience: Experienced User

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I will create a design with specific fonts. When I reopen that design and try to edit the text, the font always changes to "Standard Symbols".

How can I prevent this from happening?

No replies ?

It might be peculiar to your installation, however the usual cause is simply the font is no longer available to Gimp.

It might be the .xcf file was made on another machine and the font used is not installed on the current computer
or
The font is not 'global' it is a Gimp only font and for some reason moved out of the Gimp user fonts folder. This can happen when using a resource manager.

You might already have this plugin, A little ofnuts utility text-info-0.1.py (dated 2014-08-26) from http://sourceforge.net/projects/gimp-to ... s/scripts/

Providing you have not 'altered' the text layer, it gives some details. A 30 second example here: https://i.imgur.com/YKN2dBY.mp4

The plugin entry is bottom of the layers menu.
Then it is down to a search for the missing font

edit: Just a thought. Gimp 2.10.24 - then not default which is 2.10.18 - is this a flatpak / snap / PPA gimp 2.10.24 ?

I am using flatpak 2.10.24.

I have installed the plug-in you suggested and that does help in identifying the fonts prior to editing them.

All my fonts travel with me from one installation to the next. My Gimp file folder, which is set up in the preferences at every system/version update, is always available. When I go to edit the text, it just changes to the "Standard Symbols" font yet the font which was used is still available in the font menu.

It's odd, for sure.

I thought there might be a default somewhere that I missed.

Thanks.

Best guess, but you might have covered it in your post. However FWIW.
I do not have a Gimp 2.10.24 flatpak, similar, this is the development flatpak in a Mint 20 VM



I would check the paths to the fonts folders in your installation and if necessary put the missing fonts in
either
~/.var/app/org.gimp.GIMP/config/Gimp/2.10/fonts (crazy flatpak user profile)
or
add a new path pointing to your fonts.

Just a reminder - Gimp is an image app and not a publishing app. When you save your work [that contains fonts] as an XCF file, you now have an image of those fonts not the fonts themselves.

I have a weird font problem on my Gimp 2.10.24 installed via PPA. It doesn't recognize Bitstream Character Bold that is installed on my system. Yet the Gimp 2.10.24 Appimage has no such problems.

Hi racer. The installed Gimp version fonts are in /$HOME/.config/GIMP/2.10/fonts/
I copied all the fonts from $HOME/.config/GIMP-AppImage/2.10/fonts/ to above location.

This is what I get when I use bitstream charter bold with installed Gimp:



None of the fonts that have those symbols next to them work for me also.
The font works OK in the Gimp appimage. I recon this is one for rich2005.

All to do with the version of linux used and the pango libraries for font rendering. To keep it short, ubuntu 20.04 (and Mint 20) use a recent version of pango that does not support Adobe Type 1 and bitmap fonts. See: https://github.com/GNOME/pango/blob/main/NEWS down at version 1.44 The appimage has a older built-in version of pango and renders the fonts. This in my kubuntu 20.04 with a Gimp that uses system libraries (top) versus a Gimp 2.10.25 appimage.




Nixnine's issue might be that, but I think is a bit different, opens a Gimp image, tries to edit text and it reverts to the default font. A sure sign the original font is missing, probably compounded by a 'sandboxed' flatpak Gimp.

I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what this means. In my years of using Gimp, saved XCF files have always opened up with the fonts, if they were accessible to the program via the path listed in the font folder preference.

Yes, that was the first thing I did. Anyway, the ofnuts plugin is a big help until I can grok what the issue is. Thanks!

I see what you mean. If you leave the text tool layer active when you save to XCF you can re-open and edit text with the same font.
(or any other font)

Try Edit>Preferences>Tool Options > Reset Saved Tool Options To Default Values. It should remember the last font used after that I recon. You may lose some other tool option you previously set. Maybe another Gimp user knows another way to do it?

This is for the 'old'.xcf file and missing font issue with flatpak Gimp 2.10.24

Flatpak Gimp is sandboxed and is 'picky' about networked / external drives. If you keep your Gimp resources on say a memory stick chances are Gimp will not see them.

You can of course use the flatpak Gimp user profile ~/.var/app/org.gimp.GIMP/config/Gimp/2.10 but it is a tedious location.
My suggestion for fonts is back to linux basics and create a ~/.fonts folder. Any font in there is available to user applications as well as Gimp.

My example of this - 3 minutes duration - Mint20 - Gimp 2.10.24 flatpak https://youtu.be/pi88_tujXFY

You could say that again! Had huge problems with G'MIC due to those locked down things (tried snap as well, same-ish problem). Installed from the repo (slightly older version) because I was too lazy to dig out all the docs on how to compile Gimp.