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I have a few PDFs that do not display correctly in Preview, but do so in Adobe Acrobat, using a Macbook Pro.
I would like to be able to view these using Preview, so I want to either A.) modify the PDFs so they can be viewed or B.) Satisfy their requirement for specific fonts that my system is (apparently?) missing.
I've read about PDF conversion to PDF/A, embedding fonts, subsetting, etc. so I think I have a general handle on the problem. I've tried a few PDF Editors free trial versions, such as the PDF Editors from iSkySoft and Wondershare, to re-save the PDF. That creates a watermarked version that then has all the necessary text. The resulting file size is slightly larger, so I imagine they are either embedding or (more likely) subletting the necessary fonts in the document. I'd rather not have the watermark and since I have so few to convert, paying for these programs doesn't seem worth it for such a narrow use.
I've used pdffonts command tool to show the fonts in one such document:
name type emb sub uni object ID
------------------------------------ ----------------- --- --- --- ---------
Times-Roman Type 1 no no yes 834 0
Times-Bold Type 1 no no yes 842 0
Times-Italic Type 1 no no yes 838 0
Times-BoldItalic Type 1 no no yes 850 0
Helvetica Type 1 no no yes 846 0
Helvetica-Bold Type 1 no no yes 861 0
So, it seems like I'm on the right track as all of the fonts are neither embedded nor subsetted. Without resorting to modifying the document, is there any way to add the necessary fonts above to Preview or my System so I can just use Preview to view them? I've looked in FontBook and those fonts DO seem to be present on the system. I've tried to attach a FontBook snapshot to the question, but my rep is still too low. :-(
Is there something preventing Preview from accessing them, or have a fooled myself into thinking they are truly present? I've read about using ghostscript to embed fonts into a pdf (How to embed fonts into PDF), but it requires they already be on the system and, according to FontBook, they are?
Or, is there some inexpensive (less than $10) software that will convert PDFs to PDF/A, which I think will allow me to achieve the goal of opening these with the default application?
1It's not frowned upon at all. If you found a solution to your problem feel free to post it and accept it. It's valuable information to anyone else who encounters the same problem. – Dracs – 2014-02-03T00:40:03.177