PDFs - weird spaces in TOC and Text

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GeorgeBell
Sr. Propeller Head
Posts: 114
Joined: Thu Nov 22, 2012 3:27 am

PDFs - weird spaces in TOC and Text

Post by GeorgeBell »

I've a head banger here!

First, Word output for the same ToC is fine. The following only affects PDF.

In the ToC of the PDF, spurious spaces are appearing. (I have used underscores to more clearly represent a space)
E_DIT_:(Menu)
VIE_W:(Menu)

In the document itself, these headings appear as they should, i.e. EDIT:_(Menu) and VIEW:_(Menu)

However, there are 14 sub-topics below each. In all cases "Edit" appears with a space in the middle, and some but not all have spaces in a word after the colon, such as
Ed_it:_Und_o
Ed_it:_Red_o

As I said, the Word Target, which uses exactly the same ToC, does not show this problem. The source code reveals nothing.

Has anyone seen this before and know of a cure?
Nita Beck
Senior Propellus Maximus
Posts: 3667
Joined: Thu Feb 02, 2006 9:57 am
Location: Pittsford, NY

Re: PDFs - weird spaces in TOC and Text

Post by Nita Beck »

There is a known issue with bad character spacing in Flare-generated PDFs on a computer whose Windows text scaling is set to anything other than 100%. So go check that Windows setting and set it to 100% if it's not already. Then regenerate the PDF. Any improvement?

In an old post where this issue was discussed at length and in which a number of solutions were postulated (viewtopic.php?f=10&t=7446&p=127433, someone posted MadCap Tech Support's response: "This behavior is actually due to a bug in Flare where the DPI settings on the machine will cause inconsistent spacing between characters, rather than an error during the build... A fix for this would be to switch the DPI (dots per inch) setting on your machine to 100%. Please go to your Control Panel > Appearance and Personalization > Display > Change display settings > change the DPI to 100%. Then please log out of your machine, then log back in (these changes may not apply until you have logged out of your machine)."
Nita
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RETIRED, but still fond of all the Flare friends I've made. See you around now and then!
GeorgeBell
Sr. Propeller Head
Posts: 114
Joined: Thu Nov 22, 2012 3:27 am

Re: PDFs - weird spaces in TOC and Text

Post by GeorgeBell »

Hi Nita,

As my Danish wife would say, "Tusend tak!" - which translated means, "a thousand thanks!".

Our project is in the final stages of developing a version of Help to run on the Mac, and this is just one of a series of, should I perhaps say, "Flare design issues" we have hit upon.

Heartfelt thanks again from Northampton, England.
BrianBXYPRO
Propeller Head
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue May 03, 2016 12:04 pm
Location: Simi Valley, CA

Re: PDFs - weird spaces in TOC and Text

Post by BrianBXYPRO »

Nita, once again, you're a lifesaver! I could not for the life of me figure out why all my PDFs went haywire when I took my laptop home.

Brian
Flare ( :flare: ) v12, Windows 10
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