GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 655068
best fit zoom level forgotten after following link
Last modified: 2013-06-15 07:17:24 UTC
Created attachment 192397 [details] PDF file that demonstrates the bug. If viewing a pdf file with "best fit" zoom level, after following a link to somewhere in the same pdf, the zoom level becomes a percentage. As an effect, the page is enlarged a bit, just enough to force 2 PgDn to go to next page, making it a quite annoying bug. Attached a 2 page pdf file that demonstrates the bug. I use ubuntu 11, evince 2.32.0. Cheers. Miguel.
I am unsure if this is a bug, as the link in your pdf file has the FitR property. From PDF reference "Display the page designated by page, with its contents magnified just enough to fit the rectangle specified by the coordinates left, bottom, right, and top entirely within the window both horizontally and vertically. If the required horizontal and vertical magnification factors are different, use the smaller of the two, centering the rectangle within the window in the other dimension. A null value for any of the parameters may result in unpredictable behavior." The problem is that Best fit and fit page modes are not defined in the pdf spec, so it is unclear how we should implement Links in PDF when related to these zoom modes.
Created attachment 228200 [details] More info on this bug PDF file used to provide a bit more of information.
Hi. Thanks for taking a look in this bug report. I claim that this IS a bug. Although I am a simple user, that even had an idea of link properties in PDF files, reading the piece of PDF reference you provided, I see that this is NOT what happens when I follow a link. Best fit has no scrollbars. After following a link the page DO NOT "fit the rectangle specified by the coordinates left, bottom, right, and top entirely within the window both horizontally and vertically". Apparently page becomes larger than display area, so that scrollbar appears. Scrollbar uses more display space, so user does not manage to see the entire page, as asked by "PDF reference". However... if best fit was preserved, THEN entire page is displayed. Best fit is closer to especification of follow link than actual behavior. I made a video posted in http://youtu.be/7z23DuKAODw (or search for "evince bug 655068 demonstration") I hope this makes the case for addressing this issue. Thanks to the developers. Miguel.
Thanks for the video and the further info. Indeed, what you are seeing is indeed a bug, but different from the one you filed :P. In fact, what is happening here is that the zoom factor is being miscalculated for FitR links, but this is a different bug. I thought that you were complaining about the fact that we change from best fit to the free zooming mode, and there, I am not sure this is a bug.
Maybe I do not know how report bugs well, because several bugs are displayed and then I loose focus. What I reported is indeed best fit lost after following links. The other "bugs" just increase the annoiance of the reported "bug". Argument: keeping best fit do not hurt PDF reference, because pages are well displayed in best fit. Additionally, following link should not be the cause of an enormous and annoiying change in behavior. (For example, without continuous page display, in best fit it is possible to navigate thought up, down, right and left arrow keys, what it is NOT possible anymore in zoom mode). Your argument: I see that it is possible to be standards compliant when changing from best fit for free zoom after following link. I understand. However, keeping best fit will really prevent evince from standards compliance? I don't think so. Actually the contrary, in my opinion. Regards Miguel.
Sure, I also tend to think that keeping best fit (or fit width) is what we probably should do. The basic problem is the following: If we keep Best Fit when following links, regardless of the link properties, we would be not following the PDF specification. Should we do it, I just don't know :) as Best Fit is not part of the PDF specification either, it might make sense to ignore the spec to this respect, but I don't have the final call here. Carlos, do you have some further idea?
I think we should just follow the spec, it's true that best fit is not part of th spec, so we should switch to free sizing mode, and set the same zoom level as best fit. That's what acroread does, fwiw.
It is the same bug as Bug 684005, although the opposite desire. In both cases, Evince is honouring the standard. Closing this as duplicated. *** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 684005 ***