I'm no stranger to making PDFs in Inkscape and have made lots of image heavy PDFs with no issues opening in Adobe Acrobat and PDF reading apps like GoodNotes.
This time around, I've been wanting to make some recipe pages for myself, resulting in more text heavy PDFs.
The issue I've been having is one I can't wrap my head around whatsoever, so I'll be attaching several examples to make my plight as clear as possible.
For context, the document uses Raustila, Headline R, and FZYaoTi font families. I made the change to Headline R and FZYaoTi after I unsuccessfully exported using a Franklin Gothic font family for the headers and Segue UI for the main body of text.
Besides following the suggestion from @TylerDurden, have you tried to put your text on a separate layer? possibly atop of all the others? Something happened during the exportation and fonts are embedded; look also for grouping and mask.
Can I ask what OS you are using. Also have you installed a new version of Inkscape in the last few months ?
I had some similar text problems on Windows 10 after installing Inkscape 1.0.1 over 0.92 without uninstalling 0.92 first.
The SVGs looked fine when saved, but when reopened had unusual text effects.
Would you be willing to post the SVG for the Enchilada Skillet ? The one which results in the text with the squares when exported. I would like to look at it.
@TylerDurden I discovered that option, too, but I want this to essentially be a digital recipe book so searchable text is ultimately preferred.
@Gnuserland I didn't work on separate layers, but I'll try this later and report back.
@inklinea Windows 10 64-bit. When I exported the Ranch Dressing PDF the first few times, I was getting those issues until I de/reconstructed the file bit by bit without pasting from the original file into a new canvas: same exporting issue occurred until, as I stated, I switched out my font families and that for some reason hit the sweet spot. Had similar issue with the Enchilada Sauce PDF until, again, I tweaked it. The final straw was when, despite de/reconstructing in a new canvas as I did with the Ranch Dressing file, Enchilada Skillet wouldn't export correctly no matter what I tried, except when I deleted certain fonts from the file, which defeated the purpose of creating a text-based file.
I opened Enchilada Skillet SVG into Adobe Illustrator (I know, I know, why not just use Illustrator over Inkscape then? Inkscape is way too user friendly and I can't be bothered to learn Illustrator right now) and exported as PDF...no friggin' problems opening the resulting PDF in Adobe Acrobat. Fonts intact and all.
Forgot to mention, that yes, I did update to the most recent version of Inkscape (1.0.2 I believe? though when I checked the "About" section of the program, it said 1.0.0...even though I triple checked the page I was downloading from...so...hm)
I think an complete uninstall and reinstall of the latest Inkscape may fix it. however you could try Edit > preferences > System > Reset Preferences. Although will loose any prefs you have.
I had to delete the folder at C:\Users\YOURUSERNAME\AppData\Roaming\inkscape
before reinstalling to fix it on my windows 10 system
@TylerDurden I've used these fonts in GoodNotes before with no issues. It was just weird that the combo of fonts together didn't export to PDF properly.
Did an uninstall and reinstall of Inkscape 1.0.2 and followed @inklinea's advice to delete the folder in C drive. Reopened SVG of Enchilada Skillet in freshly installed Inkscape, saved as PDF, and it's not opening in Adobe Acrobat.
Tried @Gnuserland's idea of placing all the text onto a different layer from base...AND SUCCESS! Acrobat recognizes it now for some reason. I don't get why it's acting up because I almost always exclusively use one layer (with the exception of complicated designs) but I'm still concerned as to why this happened in the first place.
Thank you all for your help! I'll have to see if I have the same problem with future designs.
@Knoel Mine are just empiric deductions, but the point is: SVG and PDF differ totally in the way they handle fonts, and when fonts are nested inside some node of the SVG-DOM tree likely happens that is translated wrongly into a PDF structure, hence is always better keep some elements in separate layers because apparently looks like those are easier to isolate and convert properly into another format.
Tried conversion with same svg with 1.01 and 1.02. 1.0.1 works fine, fonts are embedded and reproduced correctly with different viewers (Acrobat reader, Sumatra, various browsers)
1.02 With Sumatra and browsers, fonts are visualized in a different way than svg. Sometimes also strange characters appears. With Acrobat reader it was impossible to open pdf, it says problem 117.
Beyond the Basics PDF Export Problems - No Explanation
Inkscape.org
I'm no stranger to making PDFs in Inkscape and have made lots of image heavy PDFs with no issues opening in Adobe Acrobat and PDF reading apps like GoodNotes.
This time around, I've been wanting to make some recipe pages for myself, resulting in more text heavy PDFs.
The issue I've been having is one I can't wrap my head around whatsoever, so I'll be attaching several examples to make my plight as clear as possible.
For context, the document uses Raustila, Headline R, and FZYaoTi font families. I made the change to Headline R and FZYaoTi after I unsuccessfully exported using a Franklin Gothic font family for the headers and Segue UI for the main body of text.
If the pdf text does not need to be searchable, I'd convert the text to paths when saving a copy as pdf.
Besides following the suggestion from @TylerDurden, have you tried to put your text on a separate layer? possibly atop of all the others? Something happened during the exportation and fonts are embedded; look also for grouping and mask.
Can I ask what OS you are using. Also have you installed a new version of Inkscape in the last few months ?
I had some similar text problems on Windows 10 after installing Inkscape 1.0.1 over 0.92 without uninstalling 0.92 first.
The SVGs looked fine when saved, but when reopened had unusual text effects.
Would you be willing to post the SVG for the Enchilada Skillet ? The one which results in the text with the squares when exported. I would like to look at it.
@TylerDurden I discovered that option, too, but I want this to essentially be a digital recipe book so searchable text is ultimately preferred.
@Gnuserland I didn't work on separate layers, but I'll try this later and report back.
@inklinea Windows 10 64-bit. When I exported the Ranch Dressing PDF the first few times, I was getting those issues until I de/reconstructed the file bit by bit without pasting from the original file into a new canvas: same exporting issue occurred until, as I stated, I switched out my font families and that for some reason hit the sweet spot. Had similar issue with the Enchilada Sauce PDF until, again, I tweaked it. The final straw was when, despite de/reconstructing in a new canvas as I did with the Ranch Dressing file, Enchilada Skillet wouldn't export correctly no matter what I tried, except when I deleted certain fonts from the file, which defeated the purpose of creating a text-based file.
I opened Enchilada Skillet SVG into Adobe Illustrator (I know, I know, why not just use Illustrator over Inkscape then? Inkscape is way too user friendly and I can't be bothered to learn Illustrator right now) and exported as PDF...no friggin' problems opening the resulting PDF in Adobe Acrobat. Fonts intact and all.
SVG files attached.
Forgot to mention, that yes, I did update to the most recent version of Inkscape (1.0.2 I believe? though when I checked the "About" section of the program, it said 1.0.0...even though I triple checked the page I was downloading from...so...hm)
Perfect on mine - on Ubuntu 20.04 - Inkscape 1.0.1.
I've attached the PDF.
The fonts I have installed were the same I found them at : https://www.dafont.com/raustila.font and https://www.wfonts.com/font/fzyaoti and https://fontsgeek.com/fonts/Headline-R-Regular
I think an complete uninstall and reinstall of the latest Inkscape may fix it. however you could try Edit > preferences > System > Reset Preferences. Although will loose any prefs you have.
I had to delete the folder at C:\Users\YOURUSERNAME\AppData\Roaming\inkscape
before reinstalling to fix it on my windows 10 system
I'll try also to reinstall the fonts, the issues are the fonts that weren't embedded in the PDF for some reason.
One screenshot seems to be a mobile device... if the fonts are not on the device, they might not display properly.
@TylerDurden I've used these fonts in GoodNotes before with no issues. It was just weird that the combo of fonts together didn't export to PDF properly.
Did an uninstall and reinstall of Inkscape 1.0.2 and followed @inklinea's advice to delete the folder in C drive. Reopened SVG of Enchilada Skillet in freshly installed Inkscape, saved as PDF, and it's not opening in Adobe Acrobat.
Tried @Gnuserland's idea of placing all the text onto a different layer from base...AND SUCCESS! Acrobat recognizes it now for some reason. I don't get why it's acting up because I almost always exclusively use one layer (with the exception of complicated designs) but I'm still concerned as to why this happened in the first place.
Thank you all for your help! I'll have to see if I have the same problem with future designs.
@Knoel Mine are just empiric deductions, but the point is: SVG and PDF differ totally in the way they handle fonts, and when fonts are nested inside some node of the SVG-DOM tree likely happens that is translated wrongly into a PDF structure, hence is always better keep some elements in separate layers because apparently looks like those are easier to isolate and convert properly into another format.
Tried conversion with same svg with 1.01 and 1.02.
1.0.1 works fine, fonts are embedded and reproduced correctly with different viewers (Acrobat reader, Sumatra, various browsers)
1.02 With Sumatra and browsers, fonts are visualized in a different way than svg. Sometimes also strange characters appears. With Acrobat reader it was impossible to open pdf, it says problem 117.
I definitively revert back to 1.0.1.