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__Daniel__
Known Participant
October 6, 2020
Question

Preserve space characters in pdf export

  • October 6, 2020
  • 3 replies
  • 4146 views

Hi!

 

How can we preserve space characters when exporting to the pdf format?

The document contains programming code listings, which people should be able to copy and paste into the editor/IDE to run them. But for this to be possible, all of the leading line spaces have to be preserved.

 

 

Regards,

Daniel

This topic has been closed for replies.

3 replies

Luke Jennings3
Luke Jennings3
Inspiring
October 8, 2020

Here is a possible work-around, although it involves some work. Copy each InDesign code and paste into a text editor and save as a .rtf file (rich text). Attach it to the PDF. Add a button in InDesign under each code. In Acrobat, edit the button to run a JavaScript that will open the attached .rtf file to allow for copy and paste, with the spaces and colors intact. In this example, the name of the attached rtf file is Code_1.rtf

The user would need to use Acrobat or Reader to use the buttons. You can add a message to your PDF that would only appear if the PDF were opened outside of Acrobat or Reader, the message would say something like: This PDF must be opened in Acrobat or the free Adobe Reader for full functionality.

    _
    __Daniel__Author
    Known Participant
    October 8, 2020

    Thank you!

     

    We'll think on it. It is some solution to our problem. 

    Geоrge
    Geоrge
    Brainiac
    December 20, 2021

    This problem happened to me just now. I'm sorry to bring up this topic again a year later. I found that in addition to Acrobat, Apple Preview also handles it in the same way.

     

    I have tested many readers, and it seems that only Wondershare PDFelement is the software, which can keep the code space in the document when opening the PDF file.

     

    This is not a software advertisement, just sharing what I found.
    https://pdf.wondershare.net/

     


    As mentioned by Luke - do attached text files directly in your PDF. 

     

     

    Remember, never say you can't do something in InDesign, it's always just a question of finding the right workaround to get the job done. © David Blatner
    L
    Laubender
    Adobe Expert
    October 8, 2020

    Hi Daniel,

    what's your PDF reading software?

    Did you try this with tabs instead of blank characters?

     

    FWIW: Even if my suggestion would work in one PDF reading app, in another one it could fail.

    Using formfields would require Adobe Reader either on Windows 10 or Mac OS X.

     

    Regards,
    Uwe Laubender

    ( ACP )

    _
    __Daniel__Author
    Known Participant
    October 8, 2020

    It is not about my reader, but what people are going to use to read it, so we can expect about anything. The most popular reader is a web browser (as in my case) since it does not require anything additional to be installed, and everyone has a web browser. The ebook is an addition to a printed book. We have no control over how people are going to read it.

     

    So... it sounds like there's no way to leave the spaces in the text? Why is that (I'm really trying to understand this)? Also, tabs are not an option, the indentation in Python is made by 4 spaces (PEP 8 guidelines).

     

     

    Regards,

    Daniel

    Jongware
    Jongware
    Brainiac
    October 8, 2020

    "Why is that?" Because spaces in text may be replaced with moving the cursor in a PDF. It can be more efficient, and it certainly is a requirement with justified text.

     

    (Your code is not justified – but why create separate output routines for that when you can also use a single routine?)

     

    So the PDF does not contain "one or two or four spaces", it contains text with a smaller or larger move inside. Spaces at the start are simply ignored; because you have to supply a starting point for the text anyway, why not start with the first visible character? It's all about efficiency, and originally the PDF format was designed to correctly represent a design on screen and in print.

     

    That said: there are 2 options that may help you, although InDesign does not allow immediate access to these. A PDF may contain an "ActualText" entry for any text fragment, which should be the preferred contents when copying (with the right software – your intended browser usage is actually a bad omen, and Acrobat Pro may possibly perform better even with your current file).

     

    The other option is kind of a guess. What will InDesign do when the space character is actually visible? It should then be required to output that literal character! Normally I would suggest to just try it with my very own IndyFont 🙂 as all it needs is a font with a small dot or dash in the space character – but, off the top of my head, I think IF ignores a custom space because it ought to be a rare use case, and the chances of messing up space handling would be too large.

    Still: it might be worth locating a visible-space font elsewhere and just testing to see what happens.

    L
    Laubender
    Adobe Expert
    October 7, 2020

    Hi Daniel,

    can you show one screenshot from InDesign with invisible characters showing plus one screenshot from Adobe Reader where the issue comes up? Maybe the best strategy is to provide form fields with the contents? However, then you would have to format the available text with Acrobat Pro's form field tools.

     

    Regards,
    Uwe Laubender

    ( ACP )

      _
      __Daniel__Author
      Known Participant
      October 8, 2020

      Hi Uwe,

       

      Thank you for your reply!

       

      This is how it looks like in InDesign:

      The font is Consolas (fixed char width) and the text is colored to match the code syntax highlighting in the Sublime Edit.

       

      After exporting to pdf and a try to copy the code, you can see that spaces are not preserved:

      It looks like there is just a single space.

       

      How it looks like when we copy it from the pdf file and paste into Sublime Edit:

       

      How it supposed to look (bottom part shows the spaces there).

       

      Basically, we need these space characters to be there for readers to be able to copy the code and paste it into the code editor.

       

      "Maybe the best strategy is to provide form fields with the contents?" - I'm quite new to InDesign so also not sure what does that mean, I'll google it a bit.

      "However, then you would have to format the available text with Acrobat Pro's form field tools." we cannot afford reformatting a text. The book has almost 700 pages, and many of the pages contain code inserts with a code colored to match syntax highlighting. Redoing this by hand is not really an option (we rendered this code as html, did not color it by hand). We basically just want to keep the spaces. They are there in InDesign.

       

      How should we go about it?

       

      Thank you in advance.

       

      Regards,

      Daniel

      T
      Test Screen Name
      Brainiac
      October 8, 2020

      PDF is ABSOLUTELY unsuited for this and always has been. It is not the right solution for distributing anything with technical meaning using copy/paste. InDesign cannot make PDF suitable, no matter what options you use.

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