Solution to Traveller PDFs not showing images in PDFKit based renderers (macOS and iOS)

[apastuszak]

I have to assume you installed PDF Squeezer from the Mac App Store. I installed mine from Homebrew and that directory is not there.

EDIT: Very odd. i can onlu see com.witt-software.PDF-Squeezer from the command prompt. I can't see it from Finder.

 

[CordwainerFish]

EDIT: Very odd. i can onlu see com.witt-software.PDF-Squeezer from the command prompt. I can't see it from Finder.

By default ~/Library has a flag set to suppress it from display in Finder. There's a way to fix that but I don't remember it off the top of my head. (From the shell, you can also just do open . to open a Finder window for the current directory.)

 

[apastuszak]

By default ~/Library has a flag set to suppress it from display in Finder. There's a way to fix that but I don't remember it off the top of my head.

You hold down the Option key and click on the Go menu and you'll see Library. I can get to ~/Library/Containers in Finder. But the com.witte-software.PDF-Squeezer is not there.

I made a shortcut to it on the desktop and if I double click on the shortcut; it does nothing. Strange. I'll experiment with it some more tonight.

Easy enough to get to it from iTerm and copy the PDF out to ~/Documents.

 

[BangsNaughtyBits]

Oddly, there was a Bundle of Holding with JTAS 1-12 today. Even though the last update for some of these is back in 2019, volumes 1-6 have missing covers using PDFKit. The watermarked PDFs from DriveThru do not have a similar problem.

PDF Squeezer 4 from the Mac App Store doesn't fix the files from Bundle of Holding. I screwed around for a while trying to figure out what I was doing wrong. Double-checked the PDF did work in non-PDFKit viewers. Then I tested with Rim Expeditions which was processed by PDF Squeezer as expected.

The GhostScript and pdftocairo processes also worked on the JTAS 1-6 files. It's an issue with PDF Squeezer and the way I am running it.

Just another data point.

I will point out that the JTAS 7-12 PDFs do not seem to have issues at all.

EDIT: Just noticed DriveThru says volumes 1-6 were updated last in 2019/2020 but the direct from BoH versions show internal modified dates like Feb 26, 2024 at 11:10 AM.

!

 

[Timolution]

I have to assume you installed PDF Squeezer from the Mac App Store. I installed mine from Homebrew and that directory is not there.

EDIT: Very odd. i can onlu see com.witt-software.PDF-Squeezer from the command prompt. I can't see it from Finder.

No, mine is the direct download version from the author's site. As a rule I try to avoid App Store versions of applications if a direct download version is available, as the former often have sandbox limitations in how they can approach system files/underlying system processes etc. That said, the Finder does indeed 'hide' the container in that it treats it as a folder with the app name (so in this case a folder named PDF Squeezer), but to approach it from the command prompt you need the use the actual container's name as I used.

 

[Timolution]

Oddly, there was a Bundle of Holding with JTAS 1-12 today. Even though the last update for some of these is back in 2019, volumes 1-6 have missing covers using PDFKit. The watermarked PDFs from DriveThru do not have a similar problem.

PDF Squeezer 4 from the Mac App Store doesn't fix the files from Bundle of Holding. I screwed around for a while trying to figure out what I was doing wrong. Double-checked the PDF did work in non-PDFKit viewers. Then I tested with Rim Expeditions which was processed by PDF Squeezer as expected.

The GhostScript and pdftocairo processes also worked on the JTAS 1-6 files. It's an issue with PDF Squeezer and the way I am running it.

Just another data point.

I will point out that the JTAS 7-12 PDFs do not seem to have issues at all.

EDIT: Just noticed DriveThru says volumes 1-6 were updated last in 2019/2020 but the direct from BoH versions show internal modified dates like Feb 26, 2024 at 11:10 AM.

!

I only have access to the drivethru files for these unfortunately, so cannot look into this myself. When you use PDF Squeezer, are you making sure that you also tick the 'Force image recrompression'? Otherwise images that are below your DPI threshold will not be changed to the requested colour space.

 

[BangsNaughtyBits]

I was able to access the path you provided using the App Store version to access the PDFs working folder. The PDFs had randomly assigned names but were as you described.

!

 

[BangsNaughtyBits]

I only have access to the drivethru files for these unfortunately, so cannot look into this myself. When you use PDF Squeezer, are you making sure that you also tick the 'Force image recrompression'? Otherwise images that are below your DPI threshold will not be changed to the requested colour space.

Yep. Just copied these settings to double check, then compressed the file some so I didn't have to go digging for the file. Cover in particular remains white under PDFKit. The settings I was using did work with other PDFs from the list of usual Mongoose suspects so...

The variation from pattern was just interesting with this method.

!

 

[apastuszak]

I only have access to the drivethru files for these unfortunately, so cannot look into this myself. When you use PDF Squeezer, are you making sure that you also tick the 'Force image recrompression'? Otherwise images that are below your DPI threshold will not be changed to the requested colour space.

View attachment 1859

I am not. Let me try that.