[LH4196] [Beta 29] PDF compiles work now, but not yet with transparent theme colors

[narrsd]

@tiho_d

Glad the empty pages are gone! What you describe sounds like a separate bug which deserves its own thread.

So, here we are. compiling to PDF export now works nicely in the former problem case, where not over-riding formatting.

Except, it is also replicating the font color you have for text, usually set by the theme. So if you are using a darker theme, you may still get invisible text – or ghosts, which are somewhat visible, which lets you know then what’s going on.

What should happen instead is that font color should always be over-ridden, so that PDF text will be black.

When it is, fons looks very nice now, editor or output, given Tiho’s new settings in File | Options | Editor for Display and PDF-Printing Font Hinting are set to Default. This is what you will get if you do a clean uninstall prior - new install of Beta 29, or you can set those yourself.

The attached zip contains a small project similar to before, except it uses the Solar Dark theme, which has off-white text, so that it exports as ‘ghost’. You can see the effect in the screen shot. Just remember you won’t see anything at all if several other themes using white text, like Ocean, are chosen.

It’s great to see Scrivener’s overall look so improved, and this fix ought to conclude that.

tiho-compile-29.scriv.zip (223 KB)

[devinganger]

In your Compile options, does “Remove text color” not fix this?

Failing that, a compile style could surely force the text color to all black. I don’t think that would be a great assumption for Scrivener to make…

[narrsd]

Well, good idea, and had thought if there might be something like that.

However, trying it out, this checkbox instead amplifies the problem. With it, all the fonts in the export, not just the chapter bodies that should be affected, went to ‘ghost’. Image of part of it attached - note the title etc…

I do agree that in the framework of Scrivener being ultra-configurable, it’s good that whether or not intended non-overriden colors be preserved isn’t hard-set any more than other things.

Once Tiho has the problem fixed, then he can give Remove text color an appropriate default, as he has with the new controls on font hinting algorithms.

I would suggest the default be to have Remove text color checked, as that will remove the potential for surprises when using most darker Themes – and because in most cases, people expect the export, PDF or not, to be black.

For exceptions, if you’ve composed a special where color is needed, then you’d uncheck.

Which kind of raises the question if the checkbox should also be available on Compile -guiding Section Types, doesn’t it, as then there could be special pages without commiting the entire document.

It gets endless, doesn’t it, so, judgement applies. Sorry for this part, Tiho, but you and Lee no doubt can come up with what you see best, as the basic fix is put in. Or put the extra question aside for future features, in the scheme of things.

Here’s the pic of now, with the extra checkbox set:

[narrsd]

Just to tie things together as useful, looks like another aspect of the problem from @Abeehiltz, here:

[LH4196] [Beta 29] Footnote is in white fond on white background when compiling in pdf while using dark theme

How I got the issue: I use the dark theme all the time, I compiled in pdf my project the footnote is on the document (I can find it with the search option) but written in white and not black like all the text. The footnote is showing in dark in RTF, or when I compile in PDF with the default theme.

@Abeehiltz

How I got the issue:

• I use the dark theme all the time,
• I compiled in pdf my project
• the footnote is on the document (I can find it with the search option) but written in white and not black like all the text.

The footnote is showing in dark in RTF, or when I compile in PDF with the default theme.