Evince fails in printing pdf document

[Christian Mondrup]

Binary package hint: evince

Ubuntu version 9.10
evince 2.28.1-0ubuntu1.2
Printer: Hewlett-Packard HP Color LaserJet 2605dn
Document to print: http://icking-music-archive.org/scores/banchieri/BanchieriI-Recorders-Score.pdf

When I activate printing (Ctr-P) and selects printing options the file is apparently successfully sent to the printing queue. I see a single acceptance blink on the printer lamp - and then nothing happens. When I inspect the print queue (lpq) there is no entry. I've tested the printing from within 2 browsers, FireFox and SeaMonkey (not Ubuntu package) and with the file downloaded to my local hard disk.

I get the file successfully printed with Adobe Acrobat Reader (9.2)

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Fri Dec 11 11:33:09 2009
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
ExecutablePath: /usr/bin/evince
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 9.10 "Karmic Koala" - Release i386 (20091028.5)
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Package: evince 2.28.1-0ubuntu1.2
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_DK.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-16.53-generic
SourcePackage: evince
Uname: Linux 2.6.31-16-generic i686
XsessionErrors:
 (gnome-settings-daemon:2070): GLib-CRITICAL **: g_propagate_error: assertion `src != NULL' failed
 (gnome-settings-daemon:2070): GLib-CRITICAL **: g_propagate_error: assertion `src != NULL' failed
 (polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1:2191): GLib-CRITICAL **: g_once_init_leave: assertion `initialization_value != 0' failed
 (nautilus:2165): Eel-CRITICAL **: eel_preferences_get_boolean: assertion `preferences_is_initialized ()' failed

[Christian Mondrup (reccmo)]

Another pdf document, http://icking-music-archive.org/scores/purcell_h/12_Sonatas/son12.pdf, prints OK with evince. Both files are final results of music engraving software, 1. BanchieriI-Recorders-Score.pdf produced with commercial Sibelius and 2. 12_Sonatas/son12.pdf with GPL MusiXTeX. I notice that 1. references 2 not embedded fonts (Times-Italic and Times-Roman) while 2. references solely embedded TeX fonts.

[Christian Mondrup (reccmo)]

As manager of the sheet music archive referenced in this bug report I've asked the contributor to provide an alternative version of the file giving rise to the report. I've renamed the file in question to http://icking-music-archive.org/scores/banchieri/BanchieriI-Recorders-Score-unembedded.pdf. The file now present as http://icking-music-archive.org/scores/banchieri/BanchieriI-Recorders-Score.pdf has all fonts embedded. As I expected Evince prints the new pdf file with no problems. On the background of this experience I'd expect Evince to (try to) print a file with unembedded fonts replacing with alternative fonts. I guess that's the strategy of Adobe Reader. If Evince for some reason can't complete the printing then it should explain that to the user through a reasonable error message.

[Sharoon Thomas http://openlabs.co.in (sharoonthomas)]

Hi I would like to report the same problem.

I try with mst PDFs and it fails with the Lexmark X363dn printer which has a native manufacturer written driver.

[Christian Mondrup (reccmo)]

If you're unable to print the file http://icking-music-archive.org/scores/banchieri/BanchieriI-Recorders-Score.pdf having all referenced fonts embedded, then your problem may be different from the one I've reported

[Blown2bits (blown2bits)]

Same symptoms: CUPS log files show that the document printed correctly. Printer receive light flashes then stops. Nothing comes out of printer. Printer is HP2840 on ethernet interface.

I have successfully printed documents with Evince that have all fonts embedded. The documents that will not print for me have at least one font that is not embedded. They will not print from Evince, however they will print successfully from xpdf.

I encountered three documents with the issue today (they contain personal information so I can not attach them here).

Case 1: The culprit font that is not embedded in one of my documents is Symbol, Type 1. That document was generated with OpenOffice Writer locally on my system.

Case 2,3: The non-embedded fonts are Helvetica, Helvetica-Bold, and Helvetica-Oblique. All Type 1. The document was generated by a government agency and e-mailed to me.

All other embedded fonts in document are TrueType fonts.

Going through log files, I can not find an example of a non-embedded font document that I printed with Evince before today. So I am not sure how long I have had this issue but never encountered it. However, today I encountered it three separate times on two separate computers before hunting for the bug on launchpad.

[madbiologist (me-again)]

There may be more than one bug here.

To those of you using Karmic 9.10 - Could everyone please try updating to the recently released libcairo2 1.8.8-2ubuntu1.1 package and see if it fixes your Evince printing issues?

[Captain Chaos (launchpad-chaos)]

For me it seems to have fixed it. At least, I can now print the document from bug #492850, which I couldn't before, and I have libcairo2 1.8.8-2ubuntu1.1 installed.

[Christian Mondrup (reccmo)]

After upgrade of libcairo2 my test case pdf file referenced in comment #3, http://icking-music-archive.org/scores/banchieri/BanchieriI-Recorders-Score-unembedded.pdf prints OK through evince. Compared to the 'production' file, http://icking-music-archive.org/scores/banchieri/BanchieriI-Recorders-Score.pdf misses a Sibelius (*) font 'Opus Special'.

(*) Sibelius is commercial, high-end music engraving software for Windoze and Mac OSX

[Blown2bits (blown2bits)]

I am using Karmic 9.10. I confirmed that my libcairo2 is at 1.8.8-2ubuntu1.1 (it was automatically upgraded).

I was able to successfully print a document with a Symbol, Type 1 font that was "not embedded."

The issue that I was having appears to be fixed.

@madbiologist: You suggested that there might be more than one bug here. Captain Chaos, Christian Mondrop, and myself all seem to have had the issue fixed. Is there another issue that you can see? Does it still exist on non-Karmic OS's?

@Christian (#9): For that second document that will not print: Is it specific to the Sibelius fonts? I can't see any Sibelius fonts in it through File | Properties | fonts and the first page of that document prints successfully for me.

If the issue is indeed fixed, I can mark the bug as "Fix released." I will wait a day or so for more comments/confirmation first.

[Christian Mondrup (reccmo)]

The problem I reported is _not_ specific to Sibelius fonts.

Sibelius font names typically start with 'Opus'. The file with all fonts embedded has 3 such fonts while one of these fonts, 'Opus Special' is missing in the test case file.

[madbiologist (me-again)]

Lots of great news. Sounds fixed to me.

I thought that perhaps some people had a "non-display/print of embedded fonts" problem and that perhaps some other people had the "printing to Postscript printers" problem fixed in the new Cairo package. I seems that when printing documents with unembedded fonts the Cairo update helps a lot, I'm not sure if it will help much with the on-screen display of those documents though.

Marking as Fix Released.

[Johan (johan614)]

I have the 1.8.8-2ubuntu1.1 version of libcairo2 and I am unable to print the following pdf wich dont have fonts included
http://www.cisco.com/application/pdf/paws/15254/7960_default.pdf

I am using a Sharp MX2700N attached to a Samba share.

I also get a nice little error output from the printer.

On paper:
PCL XL error
Subsystem: Kernel
Error: IllegalDataLength
Operator: ReadImage
Position: 21

/Johan

[Christian Mondrup (reccmo)]

The document prints OK with my HP Color Laserjet 2606dn.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Johan, likely you have some different issue. Reclosing since the original issue is confirmed solved.

[Denise (denise-island)]

This is all lovely, but I am not a programmer and I need to print unemployment job log and would just like a plain English fix. Thanks.