Some PDF documents appear black or in inverted colours

[HobeSoundDarryl]

It's not just Archive.org. I just had a problem with an airline ticket. Travel ticket downloaded as PDF looks fine. 4 days later, return ticket from same company using the same process shows only the barcode and none of the (textual) information on the face of the ticket. As a backup to "just use an app" ticketing, I like to save PDF versions and the only way to roll with that ticket was to screen grab it as an image file and save the image instead of the PDF. In other words, the "pdf" version of the ticket in Safari looked fine/normal but when exported to PDF file for Preview (using the same steps as the first ticket), I end up with mostly a blank page with only bar codes showing. And yes, instead of just clicking the download PDF icon in Safari, I also tried print to PDF too but same result.

Investigating further by opening the problematic one in Pixelmator, the background is transparent and lots of areas where text can be appears as white rectangles... like white-out tape strips put over the text. I tried inverting the page to see if perhaps white text on white was the issue but white strips are then black and all text still invisible (if there). I then tried putting an alternative solid color background behind the page to replace the transparency but that made no difference: transparency just became solid color, different than the white strips where text should be visible.

Not all things are lost: brand, little icons and bar codes are "normal"- just the text itself is missing/hidden/"redacted". File size is about the same size as the prior ticket, so the data is probably there- just not displaying. Again, ticket for the "to" part of the trip generated just 4 days earlier by the exact same method looks fine.

Do we miss "just works" Apple or what?

 

[Iñaki777]

You can do that here:

Product Feedback

We would love to hear your comments about any of our hardware and software products. Send us your thoughts.

www.apple.com

Oddly, the Preview App isn't listed. You could go through the Books app link. Let them know about things on the feedback page like the Books version list not being up to date.

I have just filed a report with Apple. They confirmed that this is a problem with Sequoia 15.2 and they are working on it. I gave them information about the problems described in this forum and this MacRumors forum thread to investigate. They seemed particularly concerned about the last message posted by HobeSoundDarryl:

It's not just Archive.org. I just had a problem with an airline ticket. Travel ticket downloaded as PDF looks fine. 4 days later, return ticket from same company using the same process shows only the barcode and none of the (textual) information on the face of the ticket. As a backup to "just use an app" ticketing, I like to save PDF versions and the only way to roll with that ticket was to screen grab it as an image file and save the image instead of the PDF. In other words, the "pdf" version of the ticket in Safari looked fine/normal but when exported to PDF file for Preview (using the same steps as the first ticket), I end up with mostly a blank page with only bar codes showing. And yes, instead of just clicking the download PDF icon in Safari, I also tried print to PDF too but same result.

Investigating further by opening the problematic one in Pixelmator, the background is transparent and lots of areas where text can be appears as white rectangles... like white-out tape strips put over the text. I tried inverting the page to see if perhaps white text on white was the issue but white strips are then black and all text still invisible (if there). I then tried putting an alternative solid color background behind the page to replace the transparency but that made no difference: transparency just became solid color, different than the white strips where text should be visible.

Not all things are lost: brand, little icons and bar codes are "normal"- just the text itself is missing/hidden/"redacted". File size is about the same size as the prior ticket, so the data is probably there- just not displaying. Again, ticket for the "to" part of the trip generated just 4 days earlier by the exact same method looks fine.

Do we miss "just works" Apple or what?

... about the travel tickets. We did a lot of tests in my MacStudio with 15.2 and in my MacAir with 15.1.1 just for comparison, uploaded some screencaptures and they scheduled a phone call with me next Wednesday 8 so I will post then with fresh news.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Not just 15.2. I'm running 14.7.1 on the (Silicon) Mac from which I rendered the tickets. And this is not the first encounter with that same problem. It's existed for a year or two, as I've had to do the same (screen grab as an image) thing multiple times over the last few years. For me, macOS has turned into "workaround"OS: find other ways to accomplish the same objective or close to it (thus, with this bug, screen-grabbing the airline ticket when the PDF "saves" can't save it with text showing). Hopefully, Apple will run down the bug(s) and fix it/them.

 

[Iñaki777]

Not just 15.2. I'm running 14.7.1 on the (Silicon) Mac from which I rendered the tickets. And this is not the first encounter with that same problem. It's existed for a year or two, as I've had to do the same (screen grab as an image) thing multiple times over the last few years. For me, macOS has turned into "workaround"OS: find other ways to accomplish the same objective or close to it (thus, with this bug, screen-grabbing the airline ticket when the PDF "saves" can't save it with text showing). Hopefully, Apple will run down the bug(s) and fix it/them.

How strange. That's certainly not my case. When I checked the date of the PDFs I downloaded, I saw that the problems started right after I upgraded my MacStudio from Sequoia 15.1.1 to Sequoia 15.2.
Anyway, I hope that Apple's technical support team will take into account what is said in this forum, and your information is very relevant. As I explained, they were very concerned about the trip tickets, but they did not see your message directly, because for privacy reasons, I only took screenshots of my own screen and my own messages, but I captured the name of the forum and the corresponding thread so that they could create an account and investigate it themselves. So I imagine they will see your message, although I suppose it would be better if you reported it independently. The more people complain, the more they'll rush to fix it.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I like your optimism. There are MANY bugs in macOS with some lingering for years. Many can be worked around such as I did with the ticket text. However, others are only solvable by Apple. Plenty have reported the one that bugs me the most...

That one has been like that for FIVE generations of macOS. The objective among us know it is bug(s) in macOS. It is so prevalent, not only can a simple search for those keywords find lots of posts about it on lots of websites- including Apple's own support forums- but even when trying to buy new enclosures- if there are many reviews- a search for the keywords in reviews will tend to find reports of new (and old) enclosures not staying connected to Mac.

IMO: Apple needs a snow leopard year or two focused on bug fixes & refinements vs. rolling out new-new-new features every 12 months. I presume the parade of new features drives more revenue... but "just works" likely makes for happier customers (able to buy new stuff, but sometimes less willing due to the decay of "just works").

Stuff like wonky PDFs in some cases can be worked around (though the underlying bug(s) should still be fixed). Stuff like "unexpected ejections" can only be addressed in most cases by Apple debugging port and/or power management algorithms in macOS since Big Sur. Yes, I'd like BOTH and many other bugs fixed too.

 

[IvyKing]

What's kind of weird about the Preview bug is that the "works of Poe" PDF renders correctly on my iPad (iOS 18.2) while not rendering correctly under MacOS 15.2.

 

[KoolAid-Drink]

So glad it's not me. Super annoying and I had to end up downloading Adobe Acrobat to be able to read some PDF's.

Glad Apple is aware and hopefully a fix is incoming soon. No issues viewing the same PDFs on my iPad and iPhone.

 

[Ravi_MR]

I have just filed a report with Apple. They confirmed that this is a problem with Sequoia 15.2 and they are working on it. I gave them information about the problems described in this forum and this MacRumors forum thread to investigate. They seemed particularly concerned about the last message posted by HobeSoundDarryl:


... about the travel tickets. We did a lot of tests in my MacStudio with 15.2 and in my MacAir with 15.1.1 just for comparison, uploaded some screencaptures and they scheduled a phone call with me next Wednesday 8 so I will post then with fresh news.

Thanks a lot for filing a bug report! I got super busy at work and thought I'd pick this up this weekend. Glad you beat me to it!

 

[vanc]

So glad it's not me. Super annoying and I had to end up downloading Adobe Acrobat to be able to read some PDF's.

Glad Apple is aware and hopefully a fix is incoming soon. No issues viewing the same PDFs on my iPad and iPhone.

Firefox and Chrome don't have the same issue. You may use either one as a PDF reader. Adobe Acrobat is very cluncky.

 

[benwiggy]

I have just filed a report with Apple. They confirmed that this is a problem with Sequoia 15.2 and they are working on it. I gave them information about the problems described in this forum and this MacRumors forum thread to investigate. They seemed particularly concerned about...

Wow. That's amazingly chatty.

In 15 years of reporting bugs to Apple, the only replies I've had are: "Provide us with more information"; "We've made some changes in this build", "Works as designed", or ... nothing.

 

[itjustworks!]

This is definitely not just confined to Archive.org. All my invoices are showing in this weird black and white/inverted colour format since updating to macOS 15.2 ("Sequoia must be stable by now", I thought...). An exceptional boost to my business productivity, thanks Apple!

Talked to Apple support and they were useless as expected, so it looks like it's a case of waiting and hoping a fix comes soon.

Regretting the "upgrade", but as a platform agnostic user who deliberately avoids most Apple-specific software and services I can work around it with Adobe Acrobat. This just reinforces that standpoint.

(Is this it just working?)