[gccsdk] evince

[Martin Wuerthner]

In message <4B421B05.4000301 at chocky.org>
          Peter Naulls <peter at chocky.org> wrote:

> Martin Wuerthner wrote:

>> There is also PDFView, which is based on the !PDF work and uses a lot
>> more of the original xpdf code: It can make use of xpdf's internal PDF
>> rasterizer to create a fully rendered bitmap rather than a Drawfile,
>> which is less useful for editing but supports much more advanced PDF
>> features than the original !PDF Drawfile engine.

> I think also PDFView uses a slightly newer xpdf engine, but I don't
> know how much difference that makes.

It does make a difference. For instance, the newer xpdf engine can 
read PDF 1.5 files with cross reference streams, which are 
incompatible with earlier versions of the PDF standard.

> But when I looked at !PDFView
> recently, I couldn't immediately find the source.

Yes, that is a problem. I hope someone has the address details of 
Richard to ask him to release the source code.

> Which do you think is the best bet for updating, or perhaps even
> a hybrid of both versions - a PDFView which can output Draw
> (assuming it cannot already)?

As far as I am aware PDFView builds on the latest version of !PDF and 
offers a superset of its options, so it is clear that any further 
development should be from PDFView. And yes, it can output Draw. It 
allows the user to switch between Bitmap mode (via xpdf's "Splash" 
device) and Vector mode (via the original !PDF Draw file device). 
Unfortunately, in its present form PDFView is next to useless for me 
because it locks my machine when I click into its window, which 
happens all too easily.

Martin
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Martin Wuerthner          MW Software          martin at mw-software.com
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