Introduction

Evince is the default application in Ubuntu for opening .pdf, .ps and other similar types of files.

Most bugs related to Evince fall into 3 categories:

1. Evince crashes when I open a specific document (or when I open it and perform a specific action, like scroll, zoom or rotate)
2. Evince does not display ("render") the document correctly
3. Evince displays the document as it should, but then doesn't print it correctly

Debugging procedure

Finding the right package

Evince uses

• libpoppler for rendering pdf files

• libspectre for rendering postscript files

• libpango, libfreetype and fontconfig for fonts choosing and rendering

• libcairo for 2D vector graphics

Crash or Freeze

In case Evince crashes, follow standard DebuggingProgramCrash procedures.

Rendering issues

File missing

If the crash/incorrect rendering appears only with a specific document, obtaining that document will help. Here's a stock reply to use in this case:

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu even better!  It would be quite helpful if you attach the document you are having a problem with so we can better recreate this bug and work on fixing it.  Thanks in advance.

Different programs

Once you have the related document, try opening it with different viewers to try and isolate the problem:

• Adobe Reader (package acroread, available in the Medibuntu repository)

• xpdf

Printing problems

Sometimes, when a document printed from evince doesn't print correctly, it is not a problem with Evince, but with cups, or the specific printer driver.

Other issues

How to Forward

The upstream bug tracking system for Evince is at http://bugzilla.gnome.org/browse.cgi?product=evince

Backporting Fixes

Bug fixes are normally backported to all supported Ubuntu releases (you can see which releases are still supported here).

However, this is not always possible, for example when the code architecture has changed significantly. This means that sometimes bugs are marked as "Fix Released" even when they have been fixed only in recent versions of evince/poppler/etc.