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Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages

 
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Jeffrey Goldberg
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 PostPosted: Sat Sep 06, 2008 6:09 pm    Post subject: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

A substantial number of Windows users have been reporting some difficulties with the PDFs I've been producing on a weekly basis using Pages (part of Apple's iWork suite) on OS X. They appear to not see the material in Hoefler text on the first page of the document, although they can see material in the identical text on the second page of the same document.

Here is a sample document illustrating the problem.
http://www.goldmark.org/test/Post-2008-08-26.pdf
Note that only some people appear to be having those difficulties. I can never get detailed version information out of them, but several of them have reported that they updated Acrobat Reader on Windows to the latest version.

This problem has been going on for a while, but I'm reports of it frequently enough that I am starting to look at whether there is something I could be doing better in producing the documents.
The example listed above was produced with Pages version 3.0.2 on OS X 10.5.4. But that problem has been going on for nearly a year when I was using slightly older versions as well.

I really don't know much about how PDF works, but what I'm guessing is that for some unexplained reason the the Hoefler family font is being embedded twice (once for the first page and once for the second) and that it is being done it two different ways. The way it is being done for the first page is either buggy or tickles some bug in some rendering systems.
I should note that the people who say they can't see the Hoefler text (right column) on the front page when they view the PDF are able to successfully print the PDF and see all of the material.
Cheers,

-j
 
Bill Williams
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 PostPosted: Sat Sep 06, 2008 7:52 pm    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

In article Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages,
Jeffrey Goldberg <nobody@goldmark.org> wrote:
Here is a sample document illustrating the problem. http://www.goldmark.org/test/Post-2008-08-26.pdf
Interesting results here:

Read item with Safari (3.1.2 on imac with OS 10.5.4) Right column is blank, but dragging over blank area shows various blank fields presumably corresponding to paragraphs including one diagonally placed paragraph. Note I do NOT use Adobe reader as my default reader in Safari.
Printing from Safari shows the right column present.
Download the file

Preview displays the file with the right hand column present! Surprising since I thought Safari used the same mechanism as Preview.
Adobe reader 8 displays the file, missing the right hand column, but printing shows the right hand column

Bill Williams
** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **
 
PDFrank
Guest





 PostPosted: Sat Sep 06, 2008 8:25 pm    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

Bill Williams wrote:


Quote:
In article Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages,
Jeffrey Goldberg <nobody@goldmark.org> wrote:
Here is a sample document illustrating the problem. http://www.goldmark.org/test/Post-2008-08-26.pdf
Interesting results here:

Read item with Safari (3.1.2 on imac with OS 10.5.4) Right column is blank, but dragging over blank area shows various blank fields presumably corresponding to paragraphs including one diagonally placed paragraph. Note I do NOT use Adobe reader as my default reader in Safari.
Printing from Safari shows the right column present.
Download the file

Preview displays the file with the right hand column present! Surprising since I thought Safari used the same mechanism as Preview.
Adobe reader 8 displays the file, missing the right hand column, but printing shows the right hand column

What happens if you re-distill the file?
 
Jeffrey Goldberg
Guest





 PostPosted: Sat Sep 06, 2008 9:01 pm    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

In <jwjw-ECCC06.19522306092008@blackdragon.nntpserver.com>, Bill Williams wrote:

Quote:
Quote:
Here is a sample document illustrating the problem. http://www.goldmark.org/test/Post-2008-08-26.pdf

Interesting results here:

Read item with Safari (3.1.2 on imac with OS 10.5.4) Right column is blank, but dragging over blank area shows various blank fields presumably corresponding to paragraphs

OK. So you are seeing the problem too.
including one diagonally placed paragraph.

Oh, yeah. I forgot to mention that. There is a diagonal "Draft" that is set to 0% opacity in the final version. That shouldn't make a difference (and exists on page two as well).


Quote:
Note I do NOT use Adobe reader as my default reader in Safari.
Printing from Safari shows the right column present.
Download the file

Preview displays the file with the right hand column present! Surprising since I thought Safari used the same mechanism as Preview.

Yup. So there is something funny going on there. And note that page two uses the same font family as page one, but is visible all the time.

Quote:
Adobe reader 8 displays the file, missing the right hand column, but printing shows the right hand column

As I said, I'm getting lots of reports like this, but I don't know how to create the document to not exhibit this problem.
-j
 
paul.brandon@mnsu.edu
Guest





 PostPosted: Mon Sep 08, 2008 2:48 am    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

On Sep 6, 5:09 pm, Jeffrey Goldberg <nob...@goldmark.org> wrote:
Quote:
A substantial number of Windows users have been reporting some difficulties with the PDFs I've been producing on a weekly basis using Pages (part of Apple's iWork suite) on OS X.  They appear to not see the material in Hoefler text on the first page of the document, although they can see material in the identical text on the second page of the same document.

Here is a sample document illustrating the problem.
 http://www.goldmark.org/test/Post-2008-08-26.pdf
Note that only some people appear to be having those difficulties.  I can never get detailed version information out of them, but several of them have reported that they updated Acrobat Reader on Windows to the latest version.

This problem has been going on for a while, but I'm reports of it frequently enough that I am starting to look at whether there is something I could be doing better in producing the documents.
The example listed above was produced with Pages version 3.0.2 on OS X 10.5.4.  But that problem has been going on for nearly a year when I was using slightly older versions as well.

I really don't know much about how PDF works, but what I'm guessing is that for some unexplained reason the the Hoefler family font is being embedded twice (once for the first page and once for the second) and that it is being done it two different ways.  The way it is being done for the first page is either buggy or tickles some bug in some rendering systems.
I should note that the people who say they can't see the Hoefler text (right column) on the front page when they view the PDF are able to successfully print the PDF and see all of the material.
Cheers,

-j

--
Jeffrey Goldberg                    http://www.goldmark.org/jeff/   I rarely read top-posted, over-quoting or HTML postings.  http://improve-usenet.org/

There are two different ways to generate a PDF file from Pages. First, you can use the EXPORT function to save a PDF file directly from Pages.
Second, you can go to the PRINT dialog box and use the PDF function there.
Which are you using (I'd guess the first)?
Do both methods give you the same result?
 
Jeffrey Goldberg
Guest





 PostPosted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 8:23 pm    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

In <lvidnSO4pfTsgl7VnZ2dnUVZ_vOdnZ2d@rcn.net>, PDFrank wrote:

Quote:
Quote:
Jeffrey Goldberg <nobody@goldmark.org> wrote:
Here is a sample document illustrating the problem. http://www.goldmark.org/test/Post-2008-08-26.pdf
Preview displays the file with the right hand column present! Surprising since I thought Safari used the same mechanism as Preview.
Adobe reader 8 displays the file, missing the right hand column, but printing shows the right hand column

What happens if you re-distill the file?

I'm not sure what you mean by "re-distill". The PDF was generated from Pages presumably using Apple's PDF Document kit. So its not clear to me that it was ever distilled in the first place. Are you recommending that there is something I could do with the files with Acrobat? I am very open to suggestions, but since I only ever rarely use Acrobat, I will need a bit more guidance.

Cheers,

-j
 
PDFrank
Guest





 PostPosted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 9:08 pm    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

Jeffrey Goldberg wrote:

Quote:
In <lvidnSO4pfTsgl7VnZ2dnUVZ_vOdnZ2d@rcn.net>, PDFrank wrote:

Quote:
Quote:
Jeffrey Goldberg <nobody@goldmark.org> wrote:
Here is a sample document illustrating the problem. http://www.goldmark.org/test/Post-2008-08-26.pdf
Preview displays the file with the right hand column present! Surprising since I thought Safari used the same mechanism as Preview.
Adobe reader 8 displays the file, missing the right hand column, but printing shows the right hand column

What happens if you re-distill the file?

I'm not sure what you mean by "re-distill". The PDF was generated from Pages presumably using Apple's PDF Document kit. So its not clear to me that it was ever distilled in the first place. Are you recommending that there is something I could do with the files with Acrobat? I am very open to suggestions, but since I only ever rarely use Acrobat, I will need a bit more guidance.

Well then, dust the cobwebs off of that old Distiller and just "print" that funny PDF to it, and see what you get.

You got nothin' to lose.
 
Jeffrey Goldberg
Guest





 PostPosted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 10:29 pm    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

In <J86dnU2r5KUx8lXVnZ2dnUVZ_rfinZ2d@rcn.net>, PDFrank wrote:

Quote:
Jeffrey Goldberg wrote:


Quote:
I'm not sure what you mean by "re-distill". [...] I am very open to suggestions, but since I only ever rarely use Acrobat, I will need a bit more guidance.

Well then, dust the cobwebs off of that old Distiller and just "print" that funny PDF to it, and see what you get.

When I say I need more guidance, I wasn't kidding. Where do I find this "distiller" of which you speak?

If I bring up Adobe Reader and try to print the file as PDF, I get a pop-up telling me to just use "Save as" to make a copy.
-j
 
P. Sture
Guest





 PostPosted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 9:15 pm    Post subject: Re: Broken(?) PDF from iWork Pages Back to top

In article
<alpine.OSX.2.00.0809102118560.1090@hagrid.ewd.goldmark.org>, Jeffrey Goldberg <nobody@goldmark.org> wrote:

Quote:
In <J86dnU2r5KUx8lXVnZ2dnUVZ_rfinZ2d@rcn.net>, PDFrank wrote:
> Jeffrey Goldberg wrote:

>> I'm not sure what you mean by "re-distill". [...] I am very open to >> suggestions, but since I only ever rarely use Acrobat, I will need a >> bit more guidance.

> Well then, dust the cobwebs off of that old Distiller and just "print" that > funny PDF to it, and see what you get.

When I say I need more guidance, I wasn't kidding. Where do I find this "distiller" of which you speak?

If I bring up Adobe Reader and try to print the file as PDF, I get a pop-up telling me to just use "Save as" to make a copy.

"Adobe Acrobat Distiller - What is Distiller"
<http://desktoppub.about.com/od/pdf/g/distiller.htm>
(I deliberately haven't pointed you at the Adobe page, since it wants JS enabled and might want me to download the latest Acrobat as well, so I didn't look any further Smile)
 
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