Strange font “substitution” or what it is

T.K.

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Feb 6, 2012, 9:05:31 AM2/6/12

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Hello, has anybody encountered this problem?

A pdf file opened in AdobeReader 9.4.2 for Linux on Mandriva 10.2 looks
like this:

http://camelot.lf2.cuni.cz/~kucerato/1.jpg

The file was created by MS Word 2007 on Vista using Word‘s own “Save as”
→ “PDF or XPS”.

Any advice is welcomed!

Thanks Tomáš

Peter Flynn

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Feb 6, 2012, 4:01:31 PM2/6/12

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Perhaps the document was created without the fonts being embedded, so
Acrobat has used native fonts from the local operating system. This is
normal if the creator omits to embed the fonts.

///Peter

T.K.

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Feb 7, 2012, 4:12:32 AM2/7/12

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Thanks a lot for your response. That was my original hypothesis. But it
seemed strange to me that it happens with characters that are “normal”
in 99 % of the cases, and it happens without any change in font, shape
or size, sometimes even in the middle of a word… I believed that the
glyph is either embedded or not, but this looks like sometimes it is and
sometimes it is not.
Well, I know very little about font embedding mechanisms, so I‘ll advise
my colleague to look for an option “embed fonts“ or similar.

Thanks again
Tomáš

Dne 6.2.2012 22:01, Peter Flynn napsal(a):

ken

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Feb 7, 2012, 12:09:54 PM2/7/12

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In article <jgomnc$jnb$1...@dont-email.me>, mota...@seznam.cz says...

>
> Hello, has anybody encountered this problem?
>
> A pdf file opened in AdobeReader 9.4.2 for Linux on Mandriva 10.2 looks
> like this:
>
> http://camelot.lf2.cuni.cz/~kucerato/1.jpg
>

> The file was created by MS Word 2007 on Vista using Word?s own ?Save as?
> ? ?PDF or XPS?.
>
> Any advice is welcomed!

Can you post the actual PDF file ? Its not really possible to say much
from a screenshot.

Ken

T.K.

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Feb 7, 2012, 12:28:14 PM2/7/12

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http://camelot.lf2.cuni.cz/~kucerato/01.pdf

ken

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Feb 8, 2012, 3:31:30 AM2/8/12

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In article <jgrmve$79d$1...@dont-email.me>, mota...@seznam.cz says...
>
> http://camelot.lf2.cuni.cz/~kucerato/01.pdf

Well the file uses a remarkable array of fonts. Peculiarly some fonts
are present multiple times (in different forms) and even more oddly some
of the uses are embedded, and some aren't.....

I'm using Acrobat Pro 9 and Acrobat Reader X, on Windows, and both of
these display the file 'correctly'. What application and OS are you
using to display the PDF file, which produces the screenshot you posted
earlier ? It looks like Acrobat, but.....

In passing I notice that the file was modified 15 minutes after
creation, and I wonder if whatever tool modified the PDF has had some
adverse effect upon it.

This does look like a font substitution issue. The missing fonts are
flavours of Arial (named "Arial", "Arial,Bold" and "Arial,BoldItalic").
As I noted above the file does contain some fonts with those names, but
in some places these embedded fonts are not the fonts which are actually
being used. In at least two cases the switch takes place mid-word.

The substitue font used by the viewer application is not a good match
for the missing fonts, which is why it looks bad on screen.

As a previous reply stated, the originators should try and ensure that
the fonts which are used are actually embedded. Given the fact that the
file has been modified, however, I wonder if the modifying application
is hte one which is at fault. You might ask if someone 'corrected' the
file after it was produced.

Ken

Peter Flynn

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Feb 8, 2012, 3:59:03 PM2/8/12

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On 07/02/12 09:12, T.K. wrote:
> Thanks a lot for your response. That was my original hypothesis. But it
> seemed strange to me that it happens with characters that are “normal”
> in 99 % of the cases, and it happens without any change in font, shape
> or size, sometimes even in the middle of a word… I believed that the
> glyph is either embedded or not, but this looks like sometimes it is and
> sometimes it is not.
> Well, I know very little about font embedding mechanisms, so I‘ll advise
> my colleague to look for an option “embed fonts“ or similar.

Can you describe what is actually wrong with it? Having opened the whole
PDF, it looks fine, so there is obviously something about it that we
don't know. Is it meant to be in some other typeface entirely?

///Peter

ken

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Feb 9, 2012, 2:52:23 AM2/9/12

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In article <9pg60n...@mid.individual.net>, pe...@silmaril.ie says...

> Can you describe what is actually wrong with it? Having opened the
whole
> PDF, it looks fine, so there is obviously something about it that we
> don't know. Is it meant to be in some other typeface entirely?

The original post contained a URL to a screen shot of the offending
result.

http://camelot.lf2.cuni.cz/~kucerato/1.jpg

T.K.

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Feb 9, 2012, 7:03:08 AM2/9/12

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Thanks a lot to all who answered!

The problem has been solved. When the pdf was re-created in PDF/A mode,
everything is OK, so probably the font embedding was not forced in the
previous version.

Thanks again!

Tomáš

T.K.

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Feb 9, 2012, 7:07:22 AM2/9/12

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Dne 8.2.2012 09:31, ken napsal(a):

> In article <jgrmve$79d$1...@dont-email.me>, mota...@seznam.cz says...
>>

> What application and OS are you
> using to display the PDF file, which produces the screenshot you posted
> earlier ? It looks like Acrobat, but.....

It is AdobeReader 9.4.2 for Linux on Mandriva 10.2

>
> In passing I notice that the file was modified 15 minutes after
> creation, and I wonder if whatever tool modified the PDF has had some
> adverse effect upon it.

You are right, my colleague created the outlines in a second step with
Acrobat.

Anyway, the problem is solved, see the main branch of this discussion.

Thanks!

Tomáš