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Firefox introduces PDF viewer

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#31

Post by DASD »

hosay123 wrote: post #9

It's worth pointing out this is done in pure Javascript , and works by compiling PDF functions to equivalent Javascript functions which are then visible to Firefox's JIT. Despite being only around a year old, it still manages to render the majority of PDFs thrown at it (it's been my primary paper reader for the past 6 months or so). As for missing features like some complex gradients, I can't say I've missed them, ex…

I thought one of the safety features of some pdf readers was the ability to disable javascript. How does that work here if this is entirely implemented in javascript? Disregard if I'm not understanding this correctly.

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#32

Post by Watabou »

___1___ wrote: post #30
Watabou wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the mac, Firefox Nightly loads the PDF in a second while Google Chrome Dev loads in about three seconds. I can enter text in the pdf in Chrome while Firefox gives an annoying little "The pdf might not be rendered perfectly" error bar at the top. Let's try Safari: Loads in under a second maybe even faster, super quick scrolling, ability to enter text and the option to download the pdf on the bottom. This is the way…

I don't have firefox and a pdf view won't change that. Your description of Safari matches that of Chromium on Arch Linux.

Does Chromium have a built in PDF reader? I thought google adds that in for Chrome along with Flash?

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#33

Post by jevinskie »

baudehlo wrote: post #24
aviraldg wrote: post #6

Love it, but unlike Chrome's embedded PDF reader, it can't "stream" PDFs (a dealbreaker for people viewing media-heavy PDFs on slower connections)

That's interesting, because PDFs are an inherently un-streamable format. It requires seeking within the file to work (hence why command line PDF tools can't take STDIN for the PDF file - or they fake it by copying to a temp file first). I wonder how google got around that problem.

You could try to progressively render the file, pausing when a required forward reference isn't within the data you have downloaded so far.

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#34

Post by comex »

opinali wrote: post #13
hosay123 wrote: post #9

It's worth pointing out this is done in pure Javascript , and works by compiling PDF functions to equivalent Javascript functions which are then visible to Firefox's JIT. Despite being only around a year old, it still manages to render the majority of PDFs thrown at it (it's been my primary paper reader for the past 6 months or so). As for missing features like some complex gradients, I can't say I've missed them, ex…

Please take your time machine and go release PDF.js in early 2010. With good performance on the hardware and Javascript VMs of early 2010. Then I'll grant you the criticism of Chrome's PDF viewer. Otherwise, trolling... fact is, Chrome is the browser that liberated the world from Acrobat Reader. PDF.js is awesome and it may be the way to go, but as of today Chrome's viewer is still much better -- please try http://ww…

Mac users would say it was Safari. :)

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#35

Post by jpxxx »

Watabou wrote: post #21
opinali wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please take your time machine and go release PDF.js in early 2010. With good performance on the hardware and Javascript VMs of early 2010. Then I'll grant you the criticism of Chrome's PDF viewer. Otherwise, trolling... fact is, Chrome is the browser that liberated the world from Acrobat Reader. PDF.js is awesome and it may be the way to go, but as of today Chrome's viewer is still much better -- please try http://ww…

On the mac, Firefox Nightly loads the PDF in a second while Google Chrome Dev loads in about three seconds. I can enter text in the pdf in Chrome while Firefox gives an annoying little "The pdf might not be rendered perfectly" error bar at the top. Let's try Safari: Loads in under a second maybe even faster, super quick scrolling, ability to enter text and the option to download the pdf on the bottom. This is the way…

To be sure, Safari is invoking a system level PDF reader to handle inline PDFs. That's what gets you that silky performance and nice rendering.

When you pop the PDF out, it then gets passed to the full Preview.app.

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#36

Post by [deleted] »

homer-simpson wrote: post #25

What I don't understand is why Google doesn't have an open source PDF viewer? I mean, Chromium renders OpenGL, decodes movies, contains fastest JavaScript VM and it cannot view PDFs? Given what they did to JavaScript speed, can you imagine what viewer they would be capable of producing of? At least they should join Mozilla on improving pdf.js, IMO...

[deleted]

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#37

Post by blinkingled »

opinali wrote: post #13
hosay123 wrote: post #9

It's worth pointing out this is done in pure Javascript , and works by compiling PDF functions to equivalent Javascript functions which are then visible to Firefox's JIT. Despite being only around a year old, it still manages to render the majority of PDFs thrown at it (it's been my primary paper reader for the past 6 months or so). As for missing features like some complex gradients, I can't say I've missed them, ex…

Please take your time machine and go release PDF.js in early 2010. With good performance on the hardware and Javascript VMs of early 2010. Then I'll grant you the criticism of Chrome's PDF viewer. Otherwise, trolling... fact is, Chrome is the browser that liberated the world from Acrobat Reader. PDF.js is awesome and it may be the way to go, but as of today Chrome's viewer is still much better -- please try http://ww…

>Chrome's viewer is still much better

On Linux - both FF19 and Chrome Stable are very close. FF rendering is a bit jerkier than Chrome but not by much.

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#38

Post by Ygg2 »

joshmoz wrote: post #10
stuff4ben wrote: post #3

Why is this news except the fact that Chrome has had this for years? Was Adobe paying Mozilla in the same way that Google paid them for the search bar preference?

Adobe was not paying Mozilla for anything like that. Chrome simply includes a paid closed-source product (FoxIt, iirc). This was and is not an option for Mozilla for multiple reasons. It took Mozilla a while to get here, which is unfortunate, but the result is an open-source PDF reader that doesn't add yet another binary rendering engine to the browser (think security, hack-ability). Creating it made Gecko and the we…

Interestingly, there are also a prototype Flash in JavaScript called Shumway: https://github.com/mozilla/shumway

And an IIUC a DOM renderer in JS https://github.com/andreasgal/dom.js/

I don't know if PDF.js will ever reach full PDF compatibility (with all it's weird forms and other stuff), but I do hope so. With a liberal licence I can totally see people embedding pdf.js to render their pdfs on site.

Re: Firefox introduces PDF viewer

#39

Post by benatkin »

baudehlo wrote: post #24
aviraldg wrote: post #6

Love it, but unlike Chrome's embedded PDF reader, it can't "stream" PDFs (a dealbreaker for people viewing media-heavy PDFs on slower connections)

That's interesting, because PDFs are an inherently un-streamable format. It requires seeking within the file to work (hence why command line PDF tools can't take STDIN for the PDF file - or they fake it by copying to a temp file first). I wonder how google got around that problem.

engineers gonna engineer
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