Strange content list - pdf in Edge

[Formidling]

I have made an interactive pdf from Indesign. When I open it in Microsoft Edge a strange content meny appears left in Edge; a list display. It is mostly the headlines in the document, but also some strange references that doesn`t belong in the document. What are they, and how to make it dissapear to not confuse our users?

[Willi Adelberger]

How does the document look. like when you open in Adobe Acrobat?

Only Adobe Acrobat is a reliable PDF viewer wghichg can show correctly all kind of PDFs, other PDF viewer are not able to do that.

[Formidling]

It looks normal, and can`t see anything strange about it. It is just annoying that it appear in Edge, and isn`t a big problem, but it might be disturbing for the people that is going to use the document if thye open it in Edge (don`t know if the "problem" is the same in other browsers.)

[James Gifford—NitroPress]

Just to add on to what's already been said: PDF is not an enforced standard; any basement developer, software house or megacorp is free to create their own version of both reader and creation/editing tools for it. (And, sometimes it seems that all of the above have done so.)

Most third-party readers emphasize speed, small software footprint (although these days, I don't know why), "better" features or just the maker's notion of what works best. The result is that anything but simple flat pages are likely to be rendered oddly, advanced features won't work and who knows what, say, Microsoft might want to add to the mix with a "useful" extra menu.

One day we might have a digital document standard that is more or less up to current date, supports the full range of things that can be done with such a platform... and has some standards-enforcement to keep the 'ecosystem' healthy, even if it's just ratings/compliance assessments independent of each software builder. Until then  — it's use Acrobat, make all your users use Acrobat, or... enjoy the world of free interpretation. 🙂

[BobLevine]

I'm afraid, that beyond Acrobat and Reader on desktops interactive PDF is nothing but a crapshoot, and even there, if you get into more wonky things like buttons, there are issues.

If you have content that needs to be viewed in a browser, create a proper webpage for it.