Opening files into Safari show gibberish symbols and letters

Hello,

As you can see below, opening a .pdf or other type of file saved online shows random numbers, letters and symbols instead of the file I am requesting to view. I use the link on my iPhone no issues and if I open it in private browsing, no issues. This happens when I navigate through a site to the file's link or when it is embedded in an email or word document and then click the link. Copy and pasting the link does the same thing. You can see below:

User uploaded file

Would anyone be able to help me find a fix for this issue?

MacBook Pro, iOS 9.3.2

Posted on Jul 1, 2016 4:08 PM

Reply
3 replies

Jul 2, 2016 8:52 AM in response to Rtbrman12

Safari/Preferences/Advanced - enable the Develop menu, then go there and Empty Caches. Quit/reopen Safari and test. Then try Safari/History/Show History and delete all history items. Quit/reopen Safari and test. You can also try try Safari/Reset Safari. The down side is it clears all cookies. Doing this may cause some sites to no longer recognize your computer as one that has visited the web site. In Finder hold down the option/alt key while selecting the Go menu item. Select Library. Then Library./Caches/com.apple.Safari/Cache.db and move it to the trash.


Go to Safari Preferences/Extensions and turn all extensions off. Test. If okay, turn the extensions on one by one until you figure out what extension is causing the problem.


Safari Corruption See post by Linc Davis

Jul 1, 2016 4:29 PM in response to Rtbrman12

The item is a Safari browser screen image, from what version OS X and which Safari build?


The short term would be to use another browser, such as Mozilla Firefox. The link and associated files

as far as I went (from site URL in your screenshot) -- all worked OK without issue. Safari is second or

third of three browsers I use in my newest model Mac. (And I've several different Macs + OS X.)


If you already have Firefox, then test to see what renders differently. Does your Safari have a Developer

custom item in its menu bar and if so have you selected anything extra-ordinary from there lately?


• How to Download & Install Firefox on Mac - Mozilla Firefox Help:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-download-and-install-firefox-mac


The rendering of the page looks rather like a Console utility log file instead of the web page content.

-- If you downloaded a file and somehow got Console to open it, that's what it would look like.--


Not sure what to check in Safari to make it revert to a normal view. A developer setting could make it

render pages in a different way; but I've never seen one quite like that in regular browser view.


A browser can allow you to use different views to access content; to see and modify code. If you

write any HTML or edit, a word processor like TexEdit or User uploaded filebarebones.com/products/textwrangler/

you'd be familiar with alternative page views. Most of my browsers can render pages like that.


Sorry to not be of much help. If you need to see the page, and can use or get another browser,

that is a quicker way to do so. A 'web developer' option in Safari may render pages that way.


Good luck! 🙂

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Opening files into Safari show gibberish symbols and letters

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