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Preview: PDF Support

H

harveypooka

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Feb 24, 2004
1,291
0
I'm trying to get some text from a PDF I've been given by someone and Preview is (I've no idea why) having a severe problem copying text.

I select the text I want from Preview and paste it into TextEdit. I go back to Preview, select more text, copy, and when I come to paste it in - the previous text is pasted in! I've closed and re-opened Preview, the PDF and TextEdit and the problem is the same.

I'm ready to will my iMac and Preview to death - what am I doing wrong? Does Preview just suck at PDF support?
 
harveypooka said:
I'm ready to will my iMac and Preview to death - what am I doing wrong?
Click to expand...
Sounds like you are selecting the PDF itself (and not a selection of text) and placing it in a TextEdit document.

Either you are using the image selection tool or the PDF doesn't allow copying.

Does Preview just suck at PDF support?
Click to expand...
No.
 
RacerX said:
Sounds like you are selecting the PDF itself (and not a selection of text) and placing it in a TextEdit document.

Either you are using the image selection tool or the PDF doesn't allow copying.

No.
Click to expand...

The PDF allows copying. I just downloaded the Adobe Viewer and it all works fine. It must be Preview. Preview lets me select some text, then for some reason doesn't allow me to copy more.
 
The app sounds very useful to me too, but I cannot get it to work either. PB G4 OS10.4.3.

I've put it in the library folder (and also created and put it in a services folder just for good measure) but it seems to make no difference. If I select an area of text and then attempt to click and drag it just deselects the entire area (like normal behaviour). Log in/out or restart do not help.

How does it work for you?

IJ Reilly said:
Hmm, you don't really install it. Just drag the .service file to the user/Library/Services folder. Log out, log in, and it should work.
Click to expand...
 
Spectrum said:
The app sounds very useful to me too, but I cannot get it to work either. PB G4 OS10.4.3.

I've put it in the library folder (and also created and put it in a services folder just for good measure) but it seems to make no difference. If I select an area of text and then attempt to click and drag it just deselects the entire area (like normal behaviour). Log in/out or restart do not help.

How does it work for you?
Click to expand...

First, it has to be placed in the user/Library/Services folder. If you don't have a Services folder, create one. Second, it only works when you drag the pdf document onto TextEdit icon.
 
IJ Reilly said:
First, it has to be placed in the user/Library/Services folder. If you don't have a Services folder, create one. Second, it only works when you drag the pdf document onto TextEdit icon.
Click to expand...

OK. It works like that. Not actually terribly useful in that form. I thought it would work like the rest of OSX. e.g. if you select some text in Safari, you can then click hold and drag it where you want. The ability to do this from a pdf would be great.

This app gets you half way there, but since you get the entire pdf as text, you then need to manually clean it up - a lot of work when working with scientific papers.

Also it seems to work wherever I put the .service file. (On my desktop now, although it was once in the services folder.)

Of note, if you drag the pdf into a text edit window it turns it into some kind of scrollable pic/pdf file. This behaviour is the same without the .service file.
 
Spectrum said:
OK. It works like that. Not actually terribly useful in that form. I thought it would work like the rest of OSX. e.g. if you select some text in Safari, you can then click hold and drag it where you want. The ability to do this from a pdf would be great.

This app gets you half way there, but since you get the entire pdf as text, you then need to manually clean it up - a lot of work when working with scientific papers.

Also it seems to work wherever I put the .service file. (On my desktop now, although it was once in the services folder.)

Of note, if you drag the pdf into a text edit window it turns it into some kind of scrollable pic/pdf file. This behaviour is the same without the .service file.
Click to expand...

You can still select text in a pdf within Preview (or Acrobat Viewer) with the text tool. This service is good for extracting all of the text from any given pdf. I'm not sure what you mean by the last comment. When I drag a pdf file into a TextEdit window, I get the path to the document.
 
IJ Reilly said:
You can still select text in a pdf within Preview (or Acrobat Viewer) with the text tool.
Click to expand...

Yes, but you have to copy and paste. You cannot click and drag it out like you can from, say, Safari. Such behaviour would be extremely useful.

IJ Reilly said:
I'm not sure what you mean by the last comment. When I drag a pdf file into a TextEdit window, I get the path to the document.
Click to expand...
Hmmmm. When I drag a pdf file into an open text edit window i see a scrollable window containing the pdf file WITHIN the text edit window. It is quite odd. I cannot then select the text within the pdf. It is a single object contained within the text edit file.
 
Spectrum said:
Hmmmm. When I drag a pdf file into an open text edit window i see a scrollable window containing the pdf file WITHIN the text edit window. It is quite odd. I cannot then select the text within the pdf. It is a single object contained within the text edit file.
Click to expand...

Ah, yes -- this is the result when the TextEdit file is RTF but not when it's set as plain text. I never noticed this before!
 
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