Unicode character U+2693 (anchor) displays incorrectly in Inkscape installed via Macports

[Matt Bovyn]

Unicode character U+2693 (anchor) displays as a 0 with a line through it (similar to null) instead of the correct anchor. Screenshot of the sequence U+2692 U+2693 U+2694 attached.

Inkscape 92.2 running on Mac OSX Sierra

[Hachmann (marenhachmann)]

What happens if you use a different font?

I suspect that the font you're using just doesn't have that symbol, or it has it wrong. Or the fallback font on your operating system doesn't have that symbol.

Did you try out copy-pasting the symbol from a website? Does that work?

[Matt Bovyn (mbovyn)]

I tried several fonts: sans-serif, Times, Times New Roman, Courier. All show the same behavior.

I tried copy pasting the symbol from the web and entering it from the OSX unicode keyboard (from which other programs display the anchor correctly), as well as entering through inkscape. All give the same result.

Additionally, I've now reproduced the error on a second machine (same version of inkscape and OSX). On both of these machines inkscape was built using macports.

On a third machine running inkscape .91 the anchor displays correctly (also OSX Sierra). Inkscape was from the installer on this machine. This prompted me to try inkscape .92.2 from the installer on the first machine - there too the anchor displays correctly.

Could macports somehow be at fault? This seems quite perplexing.

[Hachmann (marenhachmann)]

I suspect that Times etc. don't contain the anchor at all, you can check this in the glyphs list or in the font viewer software of your choice. If a font does not contain a character, the fallback font is used. Perhaps the macports version uses a different fallback font...

see also: http://www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/char/2693/fontsupport.htm

But back to your issue: so it seems that only the macports version is affected, but not the dmg, when used on the same computer. This certainly looks as if it's related to font support in the macports port for Inkscape.

I've googled macports and font bugs, and it might be that there's an issue, but I'm not sure.
Best would be to ask the macports people themselves, as is suggested on the macports download link page at inkscape.org (they asked us to redirect people to them, when they have macports specific issues): https://inkscape.org/en/release/0.92.2/mac-os-x/macports/dl/