Mac to PC text problems: ? and ?

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patrikg - 18 Apr 2005 21:05 GMT

"Less than or equal to" and "greater than or equal to" symbols
typed in PPT X do not work when the file is opened on a PC (nor do
they work on this forum, apparently!). Same problems with symbols
(alphas, betas, etc) as well as some bullets.

Is there a fix or a workaround?

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TAJ Simmons - 19 Apr 2005 22:31 GMT

Patrikg,

this sounds like a font problem, in that a particular font on one system, is
not installed on another system.

I guess a quick workaround (not elegant) is to use

>= for greater than or equal to

<= less than or equal to

Cheers
TAJ Simmons
microsoft powerpoint mvp

awesome - powerpoint backgrounds,
http://www.powerpointbackgrounds.com
free powerpoint templates, tutorials, hints and tips etc

> "Less than or equal to" and "greater than or equal to" symbols
> typed in PPT X do not work when the file is opened on a PC (nor do
> they work on this forum, apparently!). Same problems with symbols
> (alphas, betas, etc) as well as some bullets.
>
> Is there a fix or a workaround?

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patrikg - 20 Apr 2005 17:44 GMT

> Patrikg,
>
[quoted text clipped - 31 lines]
> abuse:
> > http://www.macforumz.com/eform.php?p=581023

Thanks, but unfortunately, just typing ">=" won’t fly for our use..
;-)

Given that on a Mac, the "less than or equal to sign" is accessed by
typing "option-comma", and the "greater than or equal to sign" by
"option-period", perhaps these characters are mapped differently on
a PC?

Does it make any difference if one chooses "Insert Symbol" from the
pull down menu? What of these can and can’t one use for cross-platform
stability?

These days, I never use anything other than Arial, Times, Times New
Roman or Helvetica as my PPT files have to be cross-platform
bulletproof (hence the frustration).

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Benjamin Amsaleg - 20 Apr 2005 22:51 GMT

A few notes
- Things are different between Office:vX and Office:2004 which one are you
using ?
- Hevetica and Times (NOT Times New Roman) are not available on PC.
- On Office:2004, text is now in UNICODE. To work you need to set a UNICODE
ready font (Arial, Verdana, Times New Roman are among them)... BUT there are
times when the UNICODE ready version of those font is not installed
properly. Try to look at your Times New Roman font version. It should be 3.x
not 2.x

BTW; on my machine, it works

BAM

On 20/04/05 18:44, in article
2_581711_62f7b78e00f1ea4bb73dc597c405fdf1@macforumz.com, "patrikg"
<DoNotEmail@MacForumz.com> wrote:

>> Patrikg,
>>
[quoted text clipped - 47 lines]
> Roman or Helvetica as my PPT files have to be cross-platform
> bulletproof (hence the frustration).

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Steve Rindsberg - 20 Apr 2005 23:24 GMT

> Given that on a Mac, the "less than or equal to sign" is accessed by
> typing "option-comma", and the "greater than or equal to sign" by
> "option-period", perhaps these characters are mapped differently on
> a PC?

The keyboard mapping isn't important; it's the mapping between character numbers
(computers just deal in numbers, after all) and the characters represented by
those numbers. If I'm guessing correctly, the +- (Plus over minus) symbol should
work x-platform but >= and <= won't (they'll map to superscript 2 and 3 on the PC)

In some cases, fonts on both systems have the same characters at different
character positions, so you can enter something that looks wrong on Mac and have
it turn out ok on PC but the symbols you're after aren't "encoded" in standard
Windows fonts. IOW, they just aren't available in the font.

Try using Symbol instead of the standard font

> Does it make any difference if one chooses "Insert Symbol" from the
> pull down menu? What of these can and cant one use for cross-platform
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> Roman or Helvetica as my PPT files have to be cross-platform
> bulletproof (hence the frustration).

================================================
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
================================================

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Klaus Kamppeter - 21 Apr 2005 11:52 GMT

> These days, I never use anything other than Arial, Times, Times New
> Roman or Helvetica as my PPT files have to be cross-platform
> bulletproof (hence the frustration).

Try avoiding Arial and Times New Roman.

I have similar crossplatform problems between Excel and Word (pasting as
image) with these two fonts. I don't have this problem with these fonts:

Verdana
Trebuchet MS
Tahoma
Arial Narrow
Arial Black
Lucida Sans

Maybe your problem has something to do with mine.

bye

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----------------------------------------------------
Klaus Kamppeter klaus_usenet@wanadoo.es

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Mac Forum / Applications / PowerPoint / April 2005

Mac to PC text problems: ? and ?