RE: PDF to HTML conversion

Without understanding the exact nature of the problem, the fault could this 
be organization that creates the PDF file.  There are several ways to 
create a PDF file form a source document. The method used depends upon the 
complexity of the document and how it is "distilled" or converted to PDF. 
Most people don't know this and also don't print the document and do a page 
check to the master!

I would at least suggest you contact the owners.  As a person who has 
created many PDF documents, some of the problems made it through our 
quality assurance process.  So we relied upon users to highlight the 
problem. Does the organization, have a testing or have a quality assurance 
program? In addition, I would ask them to ensure, the web server PDF MIME 
configuration is enabled.

I have also (as well as users) had seen wingdings come in a text.  I have 
seen this be a memory problem for the person converting the document as 
well as a user problem.  If it is a user problem, I would highly recommend 
them to uninstall and reload with everything in the Windows 95 "Close 
Program" dialog box (Hit CTRL-ALT-DEL one time) except the explorer.

Two cents...rob

-----Original Message-----
From:	Kelly Ford [SMTP:kford@teleport.com]
Sent:	Thursday, August 20, 1998 12:58 AM
To:	w3c-wai-ig@w3.org
Subject:	Re: PDF to HTML conversion

This is not meant as a complaint, rather a point of clarification.

While it is indeed true that Adobe offers assorted methods for converting
.pdf files into text, folks should not consider this a reliable method of
access in all settings.  I've used these various options since they were
released to the public and the results are quite mixed.  You can usually
get the text of the file in question, but the actual layout and
presentation is sometimes another story.

I used to routinely convert this little 8-page version of the New York
Times and something that simple had some odd quirks.  The headline for the
first story ended up being in the file after the end of the second story as
a simple example.

Many complicated documents such as catalogs, statistical tables and
investment documents are almost useless.

Yes I am happy there is this option but in my view it doesn't work with
reliability enough to be counted on.

Received on Friday, 21 August 1998 08:15:21 UTC