GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 661936
evince cannot open a PDF/PS document without .pdf/.ps filename extension
Last modified: 2018-05-22 14:22:29 UTC
in Windows XP SP3, with Evince 2.32.0.145 tried http://acroeng.adobe.com/Test_Files/quickie/safe_files/TEXT.pdf tried also many other files in PDF If a file in PDF has the .pdf filename extension, Evince displays it all right. If a file in PDF has no filename extension (or other than .pdf - tried some), Evince refuses to display it and returns "File type - (application/octet stream) is not supported". Consequence: 1. Windows XP has the very bad habit of hiding filename extensions, unless told otherwise. 2. The great majority of computer users (Windows XP users amongst them), even if they've seen a filename extension before, they have no idea what it is. Some of them suspect it has something to do with file format. Amongst them are those who think that it decides the file format: change the filename extension -> change the format. 3. There are scripts for automatic generation of files in PDF, for instance perl scripts. I've seen such scripts issuing their files in PDF with .pl filename extension. Why this is so and how common it is, I know not. 4. I've seen Adobe Reader having no problem in displaying these files in PDF regardless of their filename extensions. 5. I've seen people disappointed with Evince for this reason, abandoning Evince and installing Adobe Reader to view their documents. These people could easily view their documents with Evince by changing the filename extensions, yet most of them do not want to care about filename extensions, some are even afraid of touching the file's name extension. They want just to click twice and view, and Adobe Reader gives them that.
I think this is related to an issue I am seeing as well. I am running Evince (Document Viewer) 3.2.1 which comes with Ubuntu 11.10, i386 version. If I have a PostScript file with the "ps" extension then it views just fine. If I try to open the same file (File/Open/All Files), but with a "plt" extension, then it gives the error "Unable to open document, Error opening file: Permission denied." Discovered the error when clicking on the file within Nautilus, which launches Evince (Document Viewer).
(In reply to comment #1) > I think this is related to an issue I am seeing as well. I am running Evince > (Document Viewer) 3.2.1 which comes with Ubuntu 11.10, i386 version. If I have > a PostScript file with the "ps" extension then it views just fine. If I try to > open the same file (File/Open/All Files), but with a "plt" extension, then it > gives the error "Unable to open document, Error opening file: Permission > denied." Discovered the error when clicking on the file within Nautilus, > which launches Evince (Document Viewer). Bill, your issue is different from the windows issue, please file a new bug report for your issue. (Although I must admit I cannot reproduce your issue)
This bug depends on https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=664043 Additionally, Evince' code is fixed by commit 7802664fef53b83c32548e2f477083cc47ee06cc
*** Bug 664297 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
There is a similar bug with PostScript files, so I updated the summary and the component. It does not seem to be a problem in the backend.
*** Bug 735267 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Still present in Evince 3.10.3 (Ubuntu 14.04), relevant bug report can be found at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/evince/+bug/867749
(In reply to comment #7) > Still present in Evince 3.10.3 (Ubuntu 14.04), relevant bug report can be found > at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/evince/+bug/867749 That sounds like a problem with apparmor or something alike. I could not reproduce it with Ubuntu 12.04, nor with newer ones.
After a quick look at my dmesg it looks like you're absolutely right: File named test: [12219.529055] type=1400 audit(1420318053.543:106): apparmor="DENIED" operation="open" profile="/usr/bin/evince" name="/var/run/test" pid=22519 comm="EvJobScheduler" requested_mask="r" denied_mask="r" fsuid=1000 ouid=0 After renaming to test.pdf it works as expected. This does not apply if file is in user home dir. Looks to me like distro (namely Ubuntu) specific.
(In reply to comment #9) > [...] > This does not apply if file is in user home dir. Looks to me like distro > (namely Ubuntu) specific. Thanks for checking it. I am setting back the OS to Windows.
-- GitLab Migration Automatic Message -- This bug has been migrated to GNOME's GitLab instance and has been closed from further activity. You can subscribe and participate further through the new bug through this link to our GitLab instance: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/evince/issues/245.