Bug 328766

Summary:	Text search and selection doesn't work with certain PDF files
Product:	[Applications] okular	Reporter:	Unknown <null>
Component:	PDF backend	Assignee:	Okular developers <okular-devel>
Status:	RESOLVED UPSTREAM
Severity:	normal	CC:	aacid
Priority:	NOR
Version First Reported In:	0.17.3
Target Milestone:	---
Platform:	Arch Linux
OS:	Linux
Latest Commit:		Version Fixed/Implemented In:
Sentry Crash Report:

Description Unknown 2013-12-13 15:10:52 UTC

Text search doesn't work with PDF files that were originally made using LaTeX or similar software. Selection doesn't work either, trying to copy text results in junk characters.

Same happens with Evince and Xpdf. Maybe the problem is related to poppler library? Adobe Reader on Windows works flawlessly. Search works partially in the Firefox PDF viewer.

Search and selection usually works for text that is formatted as a (mathematical) formula. This is just not very useful.

Sample PDF file here (do not click any advertisements on the site!):
http://www.mediafire.com/download/itxzg0pzex180qz/pdf1.zip

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Get a PDF created with LaTeX
2. Open it in okular
3. Try to search for some text

Comment 1 Albert Astals Cid 2013-12-14 11:41:14 UTC

This is a problem from poppler (the library we use for pdf handling) upstream since pdftotext also has the problem. Please file a bug at https://bugs.freedesktop.org/ agaist poppler about it.