# Strange squares instead of non-latin characters in \`JabRef\` user interface

**URL:** <https://discourse.jabref.org/t/strange-squares-instead-of-non-latin-characters-in-jabref-user-interface/3883>\
**Category:** Help\
**Tags:** ui\
**Created:** [July 15, 2023, 8:55pm UTC](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/strange-squares-instead-of-non-latin-characters-in-jabref-user-interface/3883 "2023-07-15T20:55:11Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Ido](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e274bd/32.png) [@Ido](https://discourse.jabref.org/u/Ido)\
**Post date:** [July 15, 2023, 8:55pm UTC](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/strange-squares-instead-of-non-latin-characters-in-jabref-user-interface/3883/1 "2023-07-15T20:55:11Z")

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Hello there.

I’ve been a long time user of `JabRef` and absolutely love it.

This isn’t really a request for help. I simply wanted to put out there a solution to a problem that others might have encountered.

Up until now I only used `JabRef` to manage citations in English. It worked perfectly well. Recently, I tried to use `JabRef` to manage citations in my native Hebrew. **The user interface did not display Hebrew characters properly. They were replaced by strange squares.**

The problem did not occur on `Windows 10` and `11`. I managed to reproduce it only on `Linux` in the following setting:

- `Arch Linux` with `KDE` and the portable versions of `JabRef 5.9`, the portable versions.
- A relatively old and somewhat poorly maintained installs of `Ubuntu 20.04` and `Kubuntu 20.04` with the portable versions of `JabRef 5.9`.

My immediate thought was that I have a locale or font problem. After wasting several hours trying to figure it out, it turned out to be a font issue. **The solution turned out to be very simple. I downloaded and installed the Segoe UI font family from the following repository: [https://github.com/mrbvrz/segoe-ui-linux](https://github.com/mrbvrz/segoe-ui-linux). Once installed, the issue was complete resolved.**

I presume that in the absence of these fonts, whatever font was actually used by `JabRef` simply did not include the proper character set for Hebrew. I assume similar issues may occur in Arabic and other non-Latin languages.

Hopefully this message will save someone some googling in future.

Thank you for a wonderful piece of software!

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**Author:** ![ThiloteE](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/discourse.jabref.org/thilotee/32/1008_2.png) [@ThiloteE](https://discourse.jabref.org/u/ThiloteE)\
**Post date:** [July 17, 2023, 6:14pm UTC](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/strange-squares-instead-of-non-latin-characters-in-jabref-user-interface/3883/2 "2023-07-17T18:14:03Z")

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Thank you for your research and your insights. I will mark this topic as solved 🙂