Using this latex file \documentclass[a4paper]{article} \usepackage{ucs} \usepackage[utf8x]{inputenc} \usepackage[english]{babel} \usepackage{pslatex} \begin{document} This is an alpha: $\alpha$ \end{document} and compiling it with pdflatex produces a file that xpdf cannot display properly. gv works fine. The pdf file is here: http://n.ethz.ch/student/homartin/download/test.pdf Another file, not created by me, would be this: http://n.ethz.ch/student/homartin/download/mathcad.bragg.cavity02.pdf I have this problem on three different systems, two x86 and one amd64. I use xpdf-3.01-r8 and poppler-0.5.1-r1. poppler-0.5.3 together with xpdf-3.01-r8 does not work, xpdf-3.01-r7 together with poppler-0.5.1 does not either.
I also have a similar problem. and i confirm pervious posters claim. xpdf does not render fonts properly. Then I downloaded xpdf-2.01.tar from http://www.foolabs.com/xpdf/ and configured with ./configure --with-freetype2-library=/usr/lib/libfreetype.so.6 --with-freetype2-includes=/usr/include/freetype2/ and rebuilt the whole stuff. Now xpdf renders properly. Not only xpdf is able to render the font rather than drawing a box, it is able to render the fonts *correctly*. Look at the attachments for the more details
Created attachment 89058 [details] The test pdf file
Created attachment 89059 [details] test.pdf as rendered by gentoo xpdf. Look at the horrible font. Compare it to pic below
Created attachment 89060 [details] test.pdf as rendered by local comiled xpdf. This one correctly renders Nimbus Sans Slanted font
Created attachment 89061 [details] Look at this bullet points, instead of using dingbats it is rendering them as letters 's' and 'y'
Created attachment 89062 [details] compared to the previous one, the local compiled xpdf correctly renders dingabts bullets. Also the font of the text is rendered correctly
Since using modular X, using "\usepackage{mathptmx}" instead of "\usepackage{pslatex}" works, the latter still doesn't. Well, working is a bit too much... The font looks rather thick, the characters overlap. Variables in formulas are not italic as they should be. Using this ~/.fonts.conf <alias> <family>Symbol</family> <accept><family>Standard Symbols L</family></accept> </alias> also displays .pdfs "correctly" that were created with "\usepackage{pslatex}". These also have non-italic variables and a thick look. The other .pdf (mathcad.bragg.cavity02.pdf) also looks better now, variables are displayed. I don't know if they _should_ be italic or not, they _are_ not. Font looks thick, although that might have been intended. With gv everything look normal for every of the described situations.
Since moving to modular X, I had only check on the issue on one computer, an amd64. There the situation is as follows: $ xpdf Warning: Cannot convert string "-*-times-medium-r-normal--16-*-*-*-*-*-iso8859-1" to type FontStruct similar error with $ xterm -fn -*-times-medium-r-normal--16-*-*-*-*-*-iso8859-1 xterm: unable to open font "-*-times-medium-r-normal--16-*-*-*-*-*-iso8859-1", trying "fixed".... using gv everything looks ok, using xpdf fonts look thick (like bold but letter are too close together) and variable are not italic. Checking on the issue on an x86 yields the same errors when starting xpdf and xterm, but xpdf renders the same pdf files fine. Using another x86, everything looks fine. Even the error messages are gone. I have no clue!
The font error was caused by the usage of ":unscaled" in xorg.conf. There was probably something wrong in /etc/fonts/something. I copied all files from another computer and it worked. I resolve this bug! Does it work for you too xalan? If you want, I can post my stuff from /etc/fonts/
