As a workaround, try updating your copy of the Cantarell font. From what I can tell by seeing your 14.04 screenshot, you have an old version installed, with no Cyrillic characters. In 12.04 it works because you have Calibri set as your UI font there, and Calibri does support Cyrillic.
** Summary changed: - Cyrillic entries render like squares in some LO widgets when libreoffice-gtk installed + LibreOffice shows squares when the UI font does not support certain characters. It does not fallback to other fonts like the rest of apps. ** Changed in: libreoffice (Ubuntu) Status: New => Triaged ** Changed in: libreoffice (Ubuntu) Importance: Undecided => Medium -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Desktop Packages, which is subscribed to libreoffice in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1344996 Title: LibreOffice shows squares when the UI font does not support certain characters. It does not fallback to other fonts like the rest of apps. Status in “libreoffice” package in Ubuntu: Triaged Bug description: 1. Description: Ubuntu 14.04 LTS Release: 14.04 2. libreoffice-gtk: Installed: 1:4.2.4-0ubuntu2 Candidate: 1:4.2.4-0ubuntu2 Version table: *** 1:4.2.4-0ubuntu2 0 500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ trusty-updates/main amd64 Packages 500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ trusty-security/main amd64 Packages 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status 1:4.2.3~rc3-0ubuntu2 0 500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ trusty/main amd64 Packages 3. I'v been hit with the strange bug for some time in LibreOffice under Ubuntu 14.04 Namely whenever I try to enter some string in LibreOffice Calc using non-latin characters, cyrillic in my case, the entry renders just fine in the cell, but it renders with a series of squares at the formula entry widget. The same happens with the search entry widget (ctrl+f). I'm hit by this bug when using both the default packages from the official Ubuntu repository, the packages from the LibreOffice PPAs but also packages that I've downloaded from the Libreoffice website. The first strange thing I've notied is that those same deb packages downloaded from the LibreOffice website work just fine under Ubuntu 12.04. Today I've done some testing (after removing the PPA packages so that ubuntu-bug would allow me to report this bug), and noticed that if I remove the libreoffice-gtk package, then I don't have this problem any more, except for the non exsistent theming and really ugly looking of LO. I conclude that the problem is not in the LibreoOffice itself but in some gtk library. I'm sending screenshots of the bug. One is taken under Ubuntu 12.04 where everything works fine, the other under Ubuntu 14.04 where this bug appears. ProblemType: Bug DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04 Package: libreoffice-gtk 1:4.2.4-0ubuntu2 ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-32.57-generic 3.13.11.4 Uname: Linux 3.13.0-32-generic x86_64 ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu3.2 Architecture: amd64 CurrentDesktop: Unity Date: Sat Jul 19 18:51:50 2014 InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-04-19 (91 days ago) InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 14.04 LTS "Trusty Tahr" - Release amd64 (20140417) SourcePackage: libreoffice UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install) To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/libreoffice/+bug/1344996/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages Post to : desktop-packages@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp