pdf imports differ on desktop and iPad

[Grimstad]

I have a large number of pdfs that were originated in Adobe Illustrator (v10). My needs for Illustrator were fully satisfied with the version, but it will not run on the latest Apple macOS Catalina. Retired, I only used Illustrator for nonprofit work. Affinity is a great deal. 

Affinity imports the pdfs with few glitches, but the text on the documents differs between my desktop and my iPad Pro. The text wraps undesirably on the iPad. Correcting this is difficult and it will take serious effort to determine whether, if reconstructed from scratch will solve the problem.

On some text strings, a character that behaves like a tab character, when deleted and replaced by a space returns the same wide space between the two words. The text is left justified, ragged, so it is not a center justified paragraph issue.

I have attached a file and will be specific about the issues, if useful. I am willing to accept a phone call, if useful to you.

Blank.afdesign

[DM1]

Hi Grimshaw, Is the iPad substituting fonts for the original fonts in your imported file? I find that’s a common issue when importing documents containing text. Are the fonts used on the desktop also available on the iPad? Embedding the fonts in the PDF should work but then again if there are adobe fonts involved, people have reported them not working in Affinity apps on the ipad. In which case Affinity substitutes a system font which will have different attributes. Unavailable fonts names show up red in the font menu if unavailable. I'm seeing a red Arial Narrow causing text to be too long and wrapping (because I don’t have that font and iPad has substituted another font in its place. If I select the text and select AI Nile font as a replacement font everything lines up again.
Hopefully mods can clarify further.

[Grimstad]

Your thoughtful reply is very generous with your time. The font in question, AI Nile is not a font difference I have ever noticed, having used Macs and iPads from their beginnings.

many thanks 

[DM1]

3 hours ago, Grimstad said:

The font in question, AI Nile is not a font difference I have ever noticed,

@Grimstad Hi Grimstad, the font missing in your PDF is arial narrow. It’s shown as red in the font list. (That’s how you know there is an issue with that font). The iPad doesn’t have aerial narrow loaded as a standard system font so designer substitutes another font in its place Unfortunately you can’t tell what was substituted, only what Font was missing. I just selected some of the substituted fonts (they appear as red) and chose AI Nile ( it was available in system) as a replacement to show the effect of changing fonts. AI Nile is narrower so looks better that whatever Designer substituted by default. 
If you have access to an Aerial Narrow font, you can load it via Designer settings. That should resolve the issues with your PDF document imports. I installed an aerial narrow font and reopened your PDF. All good. When Exporting its best to ensure you have Embed all fonts selected. That way it will always display correctly. 🙂

[Grimstad]

You are entirely correct. Though Arial Narrow has been on the Mac for as long as I can remember (and I have used it often), it was not ported to the iPad though Arial was. Many thanks.