Characters missing from .pdf the number #1 missing

Question

Level 1

10 points

Characters missing from .pdf the number #1 missing

I have invoices vendor emails me in .pdf. When I open them in google docs all of the #1 are missing? I download and save them from mail, open in Apple Preview still missing all of the #1? Open in Adobe Reader and looks perfect all of the #1 are there, so then I print to my brother printer and all of the #1 are missing from the printed document? If I use Apple mail, same thing no #1.

Of course when I contact the vendor and explain the problem, I am told "oh apple, well that is the reason. We use PC".

PRO & 30 DISPLAY, Mac OS X (10.6.6)

Posted on Jan 19, 2011 8:33 AM

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Answer 1

rmgman

Level 3

538 points

Jan 19, 2011 10:02 AM in response to ITSDISP

Just because Preview and Google Docs let you view and open PDFs mean you should use those programs to print from. Why not just use Adobe Reader (Acrobat) to print from, since you have it? After all, it was Adobe who first developed PDFs, so they know how to handle them. And Adobe Reader is FREE.

Also, the root of the problem may be in how your vendor is creating the PDFs. They may not be embedding the fonts properly or it's a font that may not have permission to be embedded at all.

Try opening one of your vendor's PDFs in Reader and go to the Menu > File > Properties and choose Fonts. This will give you a list of the fonts in the PDF and I suspect it will say that a font may not be embedded.

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Answer 2

ITSDISP Author

Level 1

10 points

Jan 19, 2011 10:18 AM in response to rmgman

We do use Adobe? When the .pdf is open in Adobe, it displays correctly, but when printed, it is missing the #1. When I check the fonts under Adobe here is what I get:

ArialUnicodeMS (Embedded Subset)
Type: TrueType (CID)
Encoding: Identity-H

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Answer 3

Jan 19, 2011 11:56 AM in response to ITSDISP

Try checking for font conflicts with Font Book. If there are some, have it resolve them.

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Answer 4

rmgman

Level 3

538 points

Jan 20, 2011 7:12 AM in response to ITSDISP

Ah, those DREADED CID Fonts!

What happens if you adjust your Acrobat Reader preferences in Page Display and turn OFF "Use Local Fonts"?

And when you print, in the advanced setting can you choose "Convert Truetype to type 1"?

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Answer 5

nreading

Level 1

0 points

Oct 25, 2011 7:54 AM in response to ITSDISP

I see this is an old post... but perhaps this is still helpful.

I was having a similar problem with disappearing characters on documents sent to me from a certain company. Just like you, Preview left out certain characters, Adobe Reader displayed it correctly but didn't print it correctly. Then I noticed the Advanced option in the Adobe Reader print dialog: "Print As Image". That worked.

I think that this forces Adobe to actually compose the page and send the composed page to the Mac printing system, rather than just sending PDF through to the Mac printing system. A little slower, it seemed, but better than garbage.

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Answer 6

Kat2208

Level 1

5 points

May 14, 2015 2:10 AM in response to nreading

I just want to say THANK YOU SOOOOOOOO MUCH.. After turning my printer upside down inside out changing cartridges your post saved my life!!!!!! it was all just a tick in the **** box arghhhh thank you!!!!!!!

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