I have some Japanese PDF files that can only be displayed in Adobe Reader, I have no problem displaying most Japanese PDF files in Preview. I wonder what is the cause of this problem? Please help me thanks.
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Preview can't display some Japanese PDF files?
- Thread starter seasurfer
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The website is Japanesepod101.com
If you don't mind to spend like 1 min and register and get one of their PDF notes, you will know what I mean.
Whenever I open those PDF files, it will only display squares. But I will have no problem if I open it with Adobe reader.
Thanks.
angelwatt
Moderator emeritus
I have gotten some free PDFs from them in the past and didn't have issues with them. Do you have Japanese support enabled on your Mac? I'm not at my Mac currently, but working from memory go to System Preferences > International > then on one of the tabs you can enable Japanese support for the keyboard. This lets you type Japanese and I think it also adds some font support, which may be giving you the problem with the PDFs.
Thanks for replying and taking the time looking into it.
I have no problem with their old PDFs as well. Yeah, I am able to type Japanese.
My problem arise with the new PDFs, if you don't mind to take a few mins and download the PDFs from the latest lesson. In all their new PDFs that started last year, they made "lesson note" and "lesson note lite", I have no problem viewing lesson note lite, but lesson note can only be view under Acrobat reader, under Preview, it appears as squares. Jpod101.com know this problem, that is why they created the "lesson note lite" version for mac user like me. However, no one seems to know why the "lesson note" are not able to be displayed in Preview.
Here is something I just discovered, if I copied those squares and paste it in a text box, all the words will be displayed.
angelwatt
Moderator emeritus
Preview in Snow Leopard has gone through some progressions and it seems to be able to view the PDFs fine from that site. I saw the squares in Leopard Preview though. It looks like they used a different service to make some of the PDFs.
Ones that look fine use: FOP 0.20.5 or GNU Ghostscript 7.07
Ones that have squares: TCPDF 4.3.005
(Got the above info from Preview using the Get Info)
So, you can tell them that particular PDF creation utility seems to be giving the problem, though I'm not certain why. It does fine on Snow Leopard's Preview though. I came across this thread where the same issue was being discussed when using TCPDF. It sounds like they may need to install some extra fonts or something. You can want to include that link to them, it may have some meaning for them.
It's possible installing some fonts onto your machine may allow you to view them correctly. That thread had some downloads, but I wasn't sure if it would be useful for users, or site owners who are using TCPDF. You can try them out. Good luck and post back if you find a solution. Others may come across the issue.
Ones that look fine use: FOP 0.20.5 or GNU Ghostscript 7.07
Ones that have squares: TCPDF 4.3.005
(Got the above info from Preview using the Get Info)
So, you can tell them that particular PDF creation utility seems to be giving the problem, though I'm not certain why. It does fine on Snow Leopard's Preview though. I came across this thread where the same issue was being discussed when using TCPDF. It sounds like they may need to install some extra fonts or something. You can want to include that link to them, it may have some meaning for them.
It's possible installing some fonts onto your machine may allow you to view them correctly. That thread had some downloads, but I wasn't sure if it would be useful for users, or site owners who are using TCPDF. You can try them out. Good luck and post back if you find a solution. Others may come across the issue.