June Windows Security Patch Broke Many EMF Files

reg (Slashdot user #5,428) writes: A Windows security patch in June broke the display of many Windows Metafile graphics across all supported versions of Windows, resulting in many old PowerPoint files and Word documents not displaying figures, and graphics from some popular applications not displaying, including at least some ESRI GIS products and files created using the devEMF driver in R. This likely also impacts EMF files created with Open Source Office suites. While the problem can be fixed by recreating the files using a newer set of options, or resorting to using bitmaps, it means that presentations or documents that used to display perfectly no longer do. Microsoft promised a fix in July, but there is still no news of when it will be available.

That's

[Waffle Iron]

Unbelievable!

Re:

[NotTheSame]

Beat me to it. The things you say [youtube.com]

Re:

[Ostracus]

"My conclusion: privacy is no longer "a thing" in the minds of the average person."

So will the REAL StopBanningMeFFS please stand up.

So... not much of an impact then

[LordWabbit2]

devEMF driver in R.

So all three programs in the world written in R that generate word documents (why not pdf for fucks sake) are broken.
I'm sure this is high on the list of things for MS to fix.

Lab meeting's PowerPoint

[DrYak]

So all three programs in the world written in R that generate word documents (why not pdf for fucks sake) are broken.

R is big in the research world. But some lab still rely on PowerPoint for their lab meeting presentations (not everyone is using LaTeX beamer). Among other arguments: it makes it easy for the Professor to drag'n'drop slides into his own presentations presenting the lab's work.

Bug Microsoft's products, including PowerPoint, are absolutely craptastic at importing vector images in PDF or SVG format. Metafile is about the safest way to integrate your R graphs.

So basically Microsoft has given a brilliant excuse to all PhDComics-style slackers to postpone their presentations.

LibreOffice/OpenOffice are similarly problematic: Linux is very popular in some research fields even on laptops (not only on the HPC) and LibreOffice is about the only way to be interoperable with MS Office junk.

Re:

[LordWabbit2]

it makes it easy for the Professor to drag'n'drop slides into his own presentations

Fair enough, I have been forced to generate reports in excel so that... and I quote "we can change the data".
Me : "But then it's not a true representation of the actual data".
The user : "Yeah, but that's what we want"
Me : "Ok"
I just make sure to remind anyone who asks that if there is any query about any particular spreadsheet it would be best that I run the extract again and give them a fresh copy.
The user is always ri

download button.

[DrYak]

I just make sure to remind anyone who asks that if there is any query about any particular spreadsheet it would be best that I run the extract again and give them a fresh copy.

In one of my past jobs, I litterally had to implement an obvious "Download" button on the LIMS (lab info mgmt sys) so that people could easily download freshly generated .xlsx files.

This is why Office gets only JPEGs

[Sir Holo]

This is why I decided, years ago, to only feed MS Office .JPG files of images.

Yes, even line art, which looks fine at a JPG quality of 10-12. At press time for a manuscript written in Word, I'd upload TIF versions to the journal.

For PowerPoint, the rule is the same. Never a problem, but a bonus, especially for cross-platform back in the day.