# Reports do not recognise Arabic characters **URL:** \ **Category:** Translation\ **Created:** [June 27, 2021, 3:01pm UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110 "2021-06-27T15:01:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ccd318/32.png) [@Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/Aziz)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 3:01pm UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/1 "2021-06-27T15:01:29Z")
Hello Gibbon community. We have been using Gibbon for 6 months successfully, and we are very happy with the flexibility it provides. I have just started looking in to the reporting module, specially after the upgrade to V 22 the issue i am facing is: all my data entries, student names, report name, reporting criteria … etc is in Arabic. but when i generated the report, it was all in question marks, Arabic characters are not recognised. how can i overcome that. Thanks Sample report to showcase the issue: ![](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/uploads/editor/g2/44miir4x13sh.png) ---
**Author:** ![ghulamabbas92](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ghulamabbas92](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/ghulamabbas92)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 4:58pm UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/2 "2021-06-27T16:58:45Z")
Hello Aziz, Welcome to the Gibbon community. The issue is font. Which font you are using for reports. Set the font to DroidSansFallback explicitly in reports. And let’s discuss if it persists. Ghulam Abbas ---
**Author:** ![Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ccd318/32.png) [@Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/Aziz)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 5:21pm UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/3 "2021-06-27T17:21:48Z")
Hello Ghulam, thanks for the reply. i am actually using the default font DroidSansFallback, but this issue appears, i might try to upload another font that i am sure supports arabic and see what happens. ---
**Author:** ![ghulamabbas92](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/e0b2c6/32.png) [@ghulamabbas92](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/ghulamabbas92)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 5:23pm UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/4 "2021-06-27T17:23:50Z")
Try appending font face in css. If it’s not working then upload freeserif font ---
**Author:** ![Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ccd318/32.png) [@Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/Aziz)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 6:22pm UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/5 "2021-06-27T18:22:25Z")
Hi again, i have uploaded a font, and used it in the template, yet the same issue. not sure about editing the font face in css, how can i do that? please link me if any recourse already available. ---
**Author:** ![sandra](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/user_avatar/ask.gibbonedu.org/sandra/32/5_2.png) [@sandra](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/sandra)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2021, 12:50am UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/6 "2021-06-28T00:50:06Z")
Hi Aziz, uploading and adding a font to a template makes it available to the PDF renderer, but doesn’t specify which parts of the template should use that font. To do that, go into Template Builder \> Mange Assets, duplicate one of your assets to test with, and edit it to add `style=“font-family: yourfontname;”` to the outermost HTML tag (which should match the font file name in Manage Assets).` ` If you’re using the mPDF renderer for your templates, check out the list of compatible fonts, it looks like there is an Arabic option: https://mpdf.github.io/fonts-languages/available-fonts-v6.html You may also need to add direction: rtl;` inside the style tag: https://mpdf.github.io/fonts-languages/bidirectional-rtl-text-v6-x.html` ---
**Author:** ![Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/ccd318/32.png) [@Aziz](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/Aziz)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2021, 6:28am UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/7 "2021-06-28T06:28:45Z")
Thanks Sandra, some how once i switched to mPDF renderer the text started working fine. also i was able to change the text direction using a custom style sheet. i still have some challenges but so far so good, thanks for the support. ---
**Author:** ![ZACelliers](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/f19dbf/32.png) [@ZACelliers](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/ZACelliers)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2022, 2:56am UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/8 "2022-06-21T02:56:06Z")
> Try appending font face in css. If it's not working then upload freeserif font Hi, in which file should one change the font? I am having a similar issue with getting our system to generate Chinese characters. Thanks in advance, Celliers ---
**Author:** ![sandra](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/user_avatar/ask.gibbonedu.org/sandra/32/5_2.png) [@sandra](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/u/sandra)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 7:13am UTC](https://ask.gibbonedu.org/t/reports-do-not-recognise-arabic-characters/3110/9 "2022-06-30T07:13:24Z")
Hi Celliers, the PDF libraries use generic fonts that don’t support a full UTF8 set by default. I’ve updated the documentation about using custom fonts, which will require some tweaks to your CSS to apply the font-family declaration for your new font. Be sure to check out the instructions and let me know if it’s still not working: [https://docs.gibbonedu.org/administrators/reports/templates/#using-custom-fonts](https://docs.gibbonedu.org/administrators/reports/templates/#using-custom-fonts)