Hi: I'm using 64 bit Ubuntu 14.04 with a parallel installation of LibreOffice Version: 4.4.0.0.alpha2+ Build ID: d273a60bfdbf9bb7623bed38667ec0647753157c - TinderBox: Linux-rpm_deb-x86_64@46-TDF, Branch:master, Time: 2014-11-20_03:05:21 - Locale: en_US
I installed this in parallel with my 4.3 installation mostly because of having been burned so many times in the past by new bugs, but the recent commentary on what are apparently "fixes" to the pdf export function compelled me to try this alpha just to see; I often need to transfer pdfs of documents and reducing sizes is important. (I often wondered why the files were so huge, but never thought to question the sizes) I can confirm that the 4.4 alpha does indeed produce significantly smaller pdf sizes with (as far as I can tell) the same quality as earlier versions have produced. BUT - as usual, there is a huge caveat ... When I first tested this, I thought that perhaps the smaller size resulted from the fact that Writer just left out quite a few of my graphics, which didn't appear in the pdf. A little further exploration, however, showed that they were not visible in the document either, although were in fact still there - just hidden under totally (and newly) opaque frames. Thinking that maybe this was a result of some sloppy formatting on my part, I changed a few of the frames to 100% transparency - permitting the graphic, which was already marked as "on top" to be displayed in Writer and saved the file (yes - under a new name - I have used betas before). I generated a new pdf and - viola - the graphics whose frames I had "fixed" showed up in the pdf. However, when reloading the document, all of the frames were again totally opaque. To cut this short, I checked and changed the style for frame contents to 100% transparency, but that did made no difference in the results. So, as they say (or paraphrase), the developers giveth and the developers taketh away. Which brings up an interesting and related question ... On the "most annoying bugs for 4.3 section (under DEV), there are several comments where a moderator (?) chastised several folks for posting about 4.2 bugs, although the submitters all seemed to be reporting 4.2 bugs that were still present (and annoying at least to them) in 4.3. This is confusing to me, and I can't quite figure out what the development process is. I poked around, but all the discussions I've run across are not at all clear. Is there a description somewhere about how all this works? My questions - in no particular order - are: Why would a bug that is annoying in one version (e.g. 4.2 above) not be given some sort of priority or at least inclusion in a later version's (e.g. 4.3) list? Is there any form of regression testing involved in assessing bug fixes? Are these "versions" treated as separate "forks" and handled by separate developers? How do "fixes" in one version make their way into other versions? And how are dependent "fixes" tracked to insure that something that fixes one branch doesn't improve but still break a different branch? I guess my overall observation based on using LO since somewhere in the early 3.x versions is that every time some bug that annoys me (or precludes me from being able to use earlier documents without having to tweak the heck out of them) is "cured," some other feature that previously worked just fine becomes broken. I'm not trying to be a wet dish rag here - and I certainly appreciate the level of work involved, but I can't help but suspect that there is some issue with the PROCESS of development and testing when these sorts of things continue to happen. That's why I'd like to understand more about the whole process. Thanks for listening ... -- View this message in context: http://nabble.documentfoundation.org/Comments-on-pdf-file-size-in-4-4-alpha-and-a-new-bug-tp4129842.html Sent from the Users mailing list archive at Nabble.com. -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: [email protected] Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/global/users/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
