Quark Forums

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We have been battling this error "The PDF "FileName.pdf" cannot be imported because security permissions are set, or it is password protected."

We have systematically canceled out certain variables that could create an error like this including the security permissions and PDF versions on the PDF's that receive the errors. For awhile we thought it was a solitary computer that had a corrupted preferences file in Quark but we no longer believe that to be the case because we have isolated that computer and the error incidences has only increased since then.  When this error happens Quark will corrupt any files thereafter until you restart Quark. We use Quark 6.1 and 6.5 on Windows XP machines. 

We have found a temporary work around for the time-being which includes avoiding certain PDF's .

 Has anyone seen this error, know what causes it and knows how to fix it permanently?

Thanks,

Lisa

 Lisa. This error normally has nothing to do with permissions. I use a Mac, not a PC, but the concept is the same. First off, XPress 6.x cannot import any PDF higher than Acrobat 5 without transparency. If the PDF is Acrobat 5 or higher with transparency you will get this error. Sometimes, when you know that the PDF you are trying to import is of a version less than Acro 5 and you still get this error, you can quit the program, reopen the document and try again and it will work.

However, the best policy is to open the PDF in Acrobat, go to File Save As... select EPS, click on options and make sure that a TIFF preview is chosen and then save out as an EPS file. Bring in the EPS file and not the PDF. Doing it this way will ensure that you don't lose anything. Imported PDFs are flaky in XPress 6.x.

The only permanent "fix" is to upgrade to the latest version of XPress which has much better PDF handling ability. Other than that option, saving out as EPS from Acrobat is the best policy. 

Yes, I recently encountered this error in Quark 6.5, while placing PDFs (ads) in a magazine layout. I was importing the files without incident, and then got the error message while placing one PDF. The result was I could no longer import any other PDF (including one I had used in a previous issue), and the ones I had imported earlier would only print at screen resolution. The only solution was to delete all the PDFs in the layout, save the file, and restart Quark. I was then able to reimport all the PDFs--although I was too chicken to place the PDF that seemed to create the problem (we were under a tight deadline). That one I converted to a TIFF before importing it. As to the root cause, I am completely mystified.

joebroderick:

As to the root cause, I am completely mystified.

 

No mystery here. QuarkXPress 6.x is not good good at handling imported PDFs. Particularly one's with transparency. Sometimes this causes it to error on previously imported PDFs. The solution is to quit and restart XPress. The better solution is to save out an EPS from Acrobat as mentioned in my earlier post and import the EPS file.

I would caution you and anyone else to NOT save a TIFF of a PDF file. When you do this you are rasterizing the entire PDF. You are turning everything in to one big image. So, now any text you have in this PDF is part of the image and has the potential to print blurry or fuzzy (bitmapped) because the type is rasterized. Better to save an EPS. If you don't have Acrobat, open the PDF in Illustrator or any other capable vector app, sub fonts if you have to and save out an EPS file with embedded fonts and then use that EPS. But saving out a TIF is not a good idea.

Well, yes, in an ideal world my company would be using a newer version of Quark, or even, um, that other page layout program. As for using TIFFs, I realize it's not an ideal solution, certainly for an ad with small type or fine lines. We have, however, used TIFFs on occasion without problems. When saving a PDF as an EPS in Acrobat, do the fonts remain embedded in the file?

 Yes. But you need to set it first. When you do a Save As, select EPS and then click on options.On the General Tab you'd specify an ASCII or Binary EPS, PS level and then in the Font Inclusion popup menu you want Embedded and Referenced Fonts. Make sure you check the Include Preview Box and select a TIF preview. The other default settings you can pretty much leave alone unless you want to change them for some reason.

 Incidentally, if the PDF has multiple pages, Acrobat will export each page as a seperate, numbered EPS.