[pdftex] Tip: pdfanim

[Enrique Vidal]

2004-08-04: Jochen Skupin dixit:
> You wrote:
> [...]
> > Here are some comments:
> > 1. Even if I have found some problems in fullscreen, it is
> >    already quite usable.
> What do you mean with problems?
> 
> The ones I know are:
> - Bad/slow rendering of animations (it's up to ADOBE to improve this :-)
> - As soon as you click on an animation keys as page up/down or enter
>    don't work anymore. This is because the clicked animation gets the
>    focus and thus all pressed keys are send to it - also not evaluated
>    in any way :-(
>    To get keys working again click somewhere outside of the animation to
>    give the focus back to AcroReader.
> 
> If there are additional problems please let me know.

No.  These are exactly the probles I have found.

> > 2. In the step mode, I badly miss a "backward step"; Is there
> >    any technical problem to implement it?  may be with the right
> >    mouse button or with the back-space key (the space key already
> >    does a forward step).
> A PushButton is used for the animation. As far as I know
> it only evaluates a mouse-click inside the button.
> Pressing enter or space key while the button has the focus gives
> just the same result. No other actions (like right mouse click or
> back-space key) are evaluated. Please someone correct me if
> I'm wrong 'cause I would like to implement this feature.
> 
> From my point of view the only way to implement a backward step would
> be a separate "backward step" button (not my preferred solution).

I would not like this solution either... But if there is no other 
means, I think this is better than not supporting the possibility 
of "backward step" actions...
 
> > 3. I find a bit uncomfortable the frame numbering format.  In
> >    all my other animation scripts I use left padding zeros; e.g.:
> >    file_001.pdf, file_002.pdf, ... file_099.pdf, file_100.pdf
> I totally agree. I just did't find the time to implement this.
> Will be in one of the next updates.

O.K.  Thanks!

> > 4. Would it be possible to allow not only .pdf frame files but
> >    also .jpg or .png ??  For certain image types these formats
> >    lead to files smaller than the .pdf ones and with better
> >    visual appearance..

> I'm not shure. At least not without a considerably amount
> of work. An included .pdf already contains all necessary
> information to be used as icon for a PushButton. These 
> info seems to be missing when trying to use .jpg or .png.
> At least I couldn't get these formats working: They
> can be imported the same way as .pdf but not be used
> as icons for a PushButton.
>
> As there are many programs out there to convert .jpg or .png to
> .pdf and thus creating the missing info (more or less not even
> changing the filesize 'cause .jpg and .png are file formats
> supported by PDF) I don't think it is worth to spend much more
> time on this.

Sorry, I did not know these technical details...  I think the 
problem of not-very-good visual appearance of pdf-converted 
images can be solved somehow.  The larger size of pdf versions 
seems more difficult to me.

Thanks again for your contributions!

-- 
Enrique.