On Sat, Oct 15, 2005 at 05:59:12PM +0100, Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> My question possibly refers to conversion at a level lower than that of LyX, but
> regardless:
>
> I often find that my supervisor, who is an avid Windows XP user, cannot view
> documents that I compile in LyX as PDF (this has gone on for over 2 years, PS
> support needs additional software for Windows). I believe he uses the latest of
> Adobe Acrobat Reader, but he might be on version 6, still. The PDF's that I
> generate appear fine in both KGhostScript and Acrobat Reader 6, as well as
> version 7 (both Fedora Core II and SuSE). The problems I have come across are
> as follows:
>
Lyx offers three ways to generate pdf on the file->export menu:
PDF (dvipdfm)
PDF (pdflatex)
PDF (ps2pdf)
Of these, one of dvipdfm and ps2pdf gave me similiar trouble. My
publisher, who uses windows, got error messages when trying to
open the pdf file. One of these methods always failed, the other one worked.
I no longer remember which, but that should be easy enough to find out.
pdf files generated with pdflatex also works fine on windows, and this
way is much quicker than the other two too.
So, make 3 pdf's, one with each method. Give them different filenames,
send all 3 to your supervisor, ask about how each of them fares.
If some of the ways work, keep using the fastest one.
> * Images disappear arbitrarily (not all of them), sometimes re-appearing as the
> viewer goes from one page to another.
>
> * Document text appears 'out of boundary' completely so the body seems to have
> slid outside.
>
> I am somewhat worried as reviewers who receive my PDF's are more likely to be
> Windows users and I do not want to give them the hassle or be led to knock my
> head against the wall, trying to resolve Adobe's bug or, less likely, Windows
> bugs. I may as well point out that, at my end, I have never had any problem
> opening PDF's that had been originally generated under a Win32 environment.
>
> Any idea what might be causing this? How can this be avoided? I have no Windows
> machines to test this on and I see no reason why I should. Isn't the intention
> of PDF's to remain consistent across platforms (among other things)? It is not
Yes, PDF's are supposed to be the same everywhere. A PDF with a bug in it
may turn out differently with different viewers though. And then there
are good and bad pdf viewers. Adobe acrobat is known for making a
mess of bitmap fonts, for example.
> a Web page that I need test under different O/S's and browsers, so I am
> somewhat upset with whoever is to blame for the deficiency. To me, it's almost
> like an embarrassment to LaTeX when my supervisor sees corrupted PDF output.
The three ways of making pdf from latex are quite different, and the generating
programs may have their share of problems. pdflatex works well for me,
but it may not be an alternative for people who need to use "pstricks"
or postscript images.
See if you can figure out wether the pdf trouble is common for windows
users, or if your supervisor is the only one with the trouble. In the latter
case he should fix his machine (reinstall or upgrade).
Helge Hafting
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