Help! Kobo Aura HD pdf cropping bug

[statusneo]

Hi from a new site member!

I recently got an Aura HD and while I'm mostly happy with it, it seems to have a bug when viewing some (but mysteriously, not all) of my pdfs. Whereas a new pdf page usually fits to the screen and can then be zoomed into and panned around, with the buggy ones only about the top left quarter of each page is displayed and no zooming or panning is possible. When I turn the page, I just see the top left quarter or so of the next page. The pdfs display normally on my Mac, in Acrobat and other programs. I got them onto my Aura HD using Calibre 1.32.0 and the software version on my Aura HD is 3.3.0 (8eb9c1f8b2, 4/17/14). I've done a couple of soft resets on the Aura HD and also tried changing the date/time because i read on a forum that that can sometimes fix bugs. I contacted Kobo customer service and although they were very polite, they were also useless. I tried to send them copies of the pdfs I'm having trouble opening and was told that they're not allowed to download any files they're emailed. So, I'm out of ideas. Has anyone else had this problem?

Thanks in advance, for any pointers!

[auraborealis]

Hi there, I'm a new site member as well-

If you can point me to a PDF that has this problem, I'll see if I can figure out a solution..

[statusneo]

Hi! Thanks for that. Here is a pdf that had the problem:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-0...it?usp=sharing

I've just done a factory resent on my device and am now setting it up again. Maybe the problem will be fixed now. We'll see. I'm still curious though, why only some pdfs weren't working before. Let me know if you come up with anything for this one.

Thank you!

[statusneo]

The factory reset didn't fix the display problem

Over to you, mysterious saviour!

[auraborealis]

Okay, I took a quick look at the PDF you provided. The problem appears to be related to the fact that page 1 is a different size from the other pages:

Page 1:

/MediaBox [0 0 100.8 155.5]

Page 2 and onward:

/TrimBox [0 0 441 666]
/MediaBox [0 0 441 666]
/ArtBox [0 0 441 666]
/BleedBox [0 0 441 666]

Most likely there's a bug in Kobo's PDF implementation and something about this slightly unusual situation is triggering it. I'm not sure there's much that I can do about other than to suggest that you remove the first page with a PDF editing package like pdftk (http://www.pdflabs.com/tools/pdftk-the-pdf-toolkit/). That might at least let you view the rest of book on your Kobo correctly.

Good luck

[Anak]

@auraborealis. Can you add this bug to the bugs section?

[statusneo]

Thanks for that; sounds like a sensible assessment. Sorry I missed this when you replied - it's just come to my attention. Will try what you suggest and report back!

[statusneo]

Yep, that did it alright. Thanks!

Do you have any recommendations on utilities for removing the first page of a batch of pdfs? Or, ideally, resizing them to the same size as the rest of the pages?

[auraborealis]

Originally Posted by statusneo

Yep, that did it alright. Thanks!

Do you have any recommendations on utilities for removing the first page of a batch of pdfs? Or, ideally, resizing them to the same size as the rest of the pages?

Glad to hear that did the trick.

To remove the first page in a script or batch file, I'd recommend the command line version of pdftk:

http://www.pdflabs.com/tools/pdftk-server/

Something like "pdftk in.pdf output out.pdf cat 2-end" ought to work.

[auraborealis]

Originally Posted by Anak

@auraborealis. Can you add this bug to the bugs section?

I'm not sure what that is, or how to do that?

[Ken Maltby]

You might want to try Koreader. It works great for PDFs on my AuraHD 3.2.0.
An install guide using the Kobo Start Menu. Just start at step 6.

Luck;
Ken

[statusneo]

This is all great, thanks. Ken, I installed koreader ok and I like its simple interface for pdfs. The challenge I find with it is navigating through my large library to find the book I'm after. Is there a search feature that will allow me to avoid scrolling through page after page of files in alphabetical order? Thank you.

[statusneo]

Also, is there a way to easily choose a location within a single pdf? The scrollbar at the bottom of the page seems to indicate progress but not allow for interaction. Am I wrong about this? Thank you.

[statusneo]

Ah, nevermind; I found the Goto feature for each pdf. But my question about searching my library remains. Cheers.

[statusneo]

Sorry to pepper you with questions but here's another: I have several pdfs that I scanned from favourite books of mine, so each page of the pdf shows a double-spread page of the book. What is the easiest way to be able to read these books one page at a time? Should I find a utility that will simply cut all the pages of a pdf in half and create two pages from the pieces, or is there reading software that will do this as I read? Thanks!