GNU bug report logs - #76155
MuseScore: missing lots of glyphs

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Roman Riabenko <roman <at> riabenko.com>
To: bug-guix <at> gnu.org
Subject: MuseScore: missing lots of glyphs
Date: Sun, 9 Feb 2025 12:05:18 +0200

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Missing glyphs in MuseScore "Insert special characters" tool, despite the
fact that the necessary fonts are installed.

How to reproduce
****************

1. Install "musescore" package or start a guix shell with that package.
2. Open "MU 4.3" application from an applications menu or start it from
   a terminal with "mscore" command, or "LC_ALL=C mscore" to ensure the
   interface in English.
3. Click "Remind me later" to close the "MuseScore Studio Development"
   dialogue informing about the new version of the software.
4. Click on a white rectangle with a large "+" on it and a "New score"
   label under it.
5. In the "New score" dialogue, click on any option in "Instruments"
   area, such as "Piccolo in C". As a result, the arrow button
   brightens, click it to "add selected instruments to score". As a
   result, the "Next" button in the middle of the three buttons in the
   bottom right of the dialogue window brightens up. Click it. In the
   next dialogue window, click "Done". An untitled score appears.
6. In the main menu of the application, select "Add", then "Text", then
   any existing element, such as "Title", "Subtitle", "Composer", etc.
   As a result, that element is selected in the "Untitled score" tab and
   the "Properties" tab appears in the left sidebar.
7. In the "Properties" tab in the left sidebar, click "Insert special
   characters" button. The "Special characters" dialogue appears.
8. In the "Special characters" dialogue, click "Unicode symbols" tab.
9. In the list in the left panel of "Unicode symbols" tab of the
   "Special characters" dialogue, select "Greek Extended".

Observed result
***************

In the "Greek Extended" section of "Unicode symbols" tab of the "Special
characters" dialogue, in MuseScore on Guix System, only the glyphs for
the following Unicode characters are displayed: "άέήίόύώΆιΈΉΐΊΰΎ΅`ΌΏ´".
The rest of the glyphs are not displayed and nothing is displayed in
their place.

Please refer to the attached file for an example output of "LC_ALL=C
mscore" while performing the above steps and closing the application.
Notably, it includes multiple instances of the following error:
"EngravingFont::draw | invalid sym: 2975"

Expected result
***************

Most of the characters are expected to be displayed. A few missing
characters are expected to be replaced with some placeholder character,
such as a question mark in some shape.

Additional information
**********************

Installing a font package with a large collection of glyphs, such as
font-google-noto package, does not affect the observed result.

Running "fc-cache -rv" updates the fonts cache but does not resolve
the above issue.

Other applications, such as gnome-characters or gucharmap, display most
of those glyphs.

Trisquel has a different version of MuseScore, which displays almost
all of the glyphs and shows a placeholder character instead of a few.

Previous discussion:
https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/help-guix/2025-02/msg00051.html

$ mscore --version
Warning: Ignoring XDG_SESSION_TYPE=wayland on Gnome. Use QT_QPA_PLATFORM=wayland to run on Wayland anyway.
MuseScore4Development 4.3.2
$ uname -a
Linux desk 6.12.12-gnu #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC 1 x86_64 GNU/Linux
$ guix describe
Generation 7	08 лют 2025 11:18:03	(current)
  guix 5674ade
    repository URL: https://git.savannah.gnu.org/git/guix.git
    вітка: master
    коміт: 5674adeb7579bdcfdb7342e6552f4735cd8f2afc

Roman

[MuseScore_250209_114316.log (application/octet-stream, attachment)]

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Message #8 received at 76155 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Noé Lopez <noe <at> xn--no-cja.eu>
To: 76155 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Cc: Roman Riabenko <roman <at> riabenko.com>
Subject: Re: MuseScore: missing lots of glyphs
Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2025 00:26:39 +0100

Hi Roman,

Thank you for the detailed bug report, it was easy to reproduce,
although the insert special characters button was at the bottom for me.

The glyphs are indeed not showing if the selected font is Edwin (the
default), but if you select a font like Noto Sans, or DejaVu Sans for
your text the characters will appear fine. It seems the “special
characters” window uses the selected font for previews.

If you can’t access your fonts in MuseScore, make sure to add fontconfig
to your shell or profile to update the load paths:

Replace: guix shell mscore font-google-noto
With:    guix shell mscore font-google-noto fontconfig

Then you will be able to select Noto Sans for your font and access these
special characters.

Does that work for you?

Good evening,
Noé

Message #11 received at 76155 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Roman Riabenko <roman <at> riabenko.com>
To: Noé Lopez <noe <at> xn--no-cja.eu>
Cc: 76155 <at> debbugs.gnu.org, gfp <gfp <at> posteo.at>
Subject: Re: MuseScore: missing lots of glyphs
Date: Sat, 22 Feb 2025 00:41:44 +0200

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Hello, Noé.

Thank you for looking into it! So, it is not a bug. I copy another user
who reported having the same difficulty in guix-help mailing list.

On Thu, 20 Feb 2025 00:26:39 +0100
Noé Lopez <noe <at> xn--no-cja.eu> wrote:

> The glyphs are indeed not showing if the selected font is Edwin (the
> default), but if you select a font like Noto Sans, or DejaVu Sans for
> your text the characters will appear fine. It seems the “special
> characters” window uses the selected font for previews.

If I select FreeSerif instead of Edwin in the side panel before clicking
the "Insert special characters" button, I achive the expected result later
in the "Greek Extended" tab. With FreeSerif, most of the characters are
displayed with only a handful of glyphs missing. FreeSerif is budled in
the musescore package, so it is readily available.

If I install the font-google-noto package and restart MuseScore, I can
also select Noto fonts. I tried Noto Sans and Noto Serif. They appear to
be missing the same glyphs as FreeSerif. So, it is not necessary to
install Noto fonts.

In Trisquel, the pre-selected font is FreeSerif instead of Edwin. There
is no package for Edwin font in Trisquel. However, I downloaded the font
from its git repository, installed it in Trisquel, and observed exactly
the same result as in Guix, which is most of the glyphs missing in the
"Greek Extended" tab.

Somehow, it did not occur to me that I need to select a different font.
Maybe, MuseScore could fall back to a different font when glyphs are
missing. But it is not a bug with the MuseScore packaging in Guix.

Roman 

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Message #14 received at 76155 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: gfp <gfp <at> posteo.at>
To: Roman Riabenko <roman <at> riabenko.com>, Noé Lopez
 <noe <at> xn--no-cja.eu>
Cc: 76155 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: MuseScore: missing lots of glyphs
Date: Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:37:10 +0000

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Hi,
thanks for looking into this matter.

> The glyphs are indeed not showing if the selected font is Edwin (the
>>> default), but if you select a font like Noto Sans, or DejaVu Sans for
>>> your text the characters will appear fine. It seems the “special
>>> characters” window uses the selected font for previews.


In my MuseScore 3.6.2 und MuseScore 4.3.2
the font "Noto Sans" is connected with Hebrew only, so it doesn´t show 
any greek letter.

I checked "DejaVu Sans", and every Greek letter is shown up as You said.
But "FreeSerif" shows most of them, as you said.

thanks

Gottfried



Am 21.02.25 um 23:41 schrieb Roman Riabenko:
> Hello, Noé.
> 
> Thank you for looking into it! So, it is not a bug. I copy another user
> who reported having the same difficulty in guix-help mailing list.
> 
> On Thu, 20 Feb 2025 00:26:39 +0100
> Noé Lopez <noe <at> xn--no-cja.eu> wrote:
> 
>> The glyphs are indeed not showing if the selected font is Edwin (the
>> default), but if you select a font like Noto Sans, or DejaVu Sans for
>> your text the characters will appear fine. It seems the “special
>> characters” window uses the selected font for previews.
> 
> If I select FreeSerif instead of Edwin in the side panel before clicking
> the "Insert special characters" button, I achive the expected result later
> in the "Greek Extended" tab. With FreeSerif, most of the characters are
> displayed with only a handful of glyphs missing. FreeSerif is budled in
> the musescore package, so it is readily available.
> 
> If I install the font-google-noto package and restart MuseScore, I can
> also select Noto fonts. I tried Noto Sans and Noto Serif. They appear to
> be missing the same glyphs as FreeSerif. So, it is not necessary to
> install Noto fonts.
> 
> In Trisquel, the pre-selected font is FreeSerif instead of Edwin. There
> is no package for Edwin font in Trisquel. However, I downloaded the font
> from its git repository, installed it in Trisquel, and observed exactly
> the same result as in Guix, which is most of the glyphs missing in the
> "Greek Extended" tab.
> 
> Somehow, it did not occur to me that I need to select a different font.
> Maybe, MuseScore could fall back to a different font when glyphs are
> missing. But it is not a bug with the MuseScore packaging in Guix.
> 
> Roman

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