Vote for features!

[kjk]

I've started https://sumatrapdf.canny.io/feature-requests so that people can vote on features.

Knowing which features people want the most will help me prioritize development work.

I've populated it with a couple of features. So please go and vote for existing features and create new feature requests for others to vote on.

This is slightly overlapping with both this forum and issues. The big thing is that it allows to sort by vote so I can see which features are most requested.

I'll interlink issues / discussions posts with those feature requests.

A guideline when creating new feature requests: don't put multiple requests (even if somewhat related) into a single requests. The smaller the scope of the request, the more likely that it'll be implemented.

[WhiteChairFromIkea]

Just a note, that Gitlab have all github's features, including sorting by upvotes. Maybe it would be useful to migrate into gitlab? This is a response to starting using Canny (why use two platforms when single can be used). This is just a hint, I am not expecting the answer, thank you for a great software, it would be harder to live without sumatra 👍🙂

[kjk]

Migrating to GitLab would be too much work and too big of a disruption for the benefit.

[Kissaki]

I’ve come to much prefer GitHub over GitLab. I would definitely prefer not seeing a move away from GitHub. (You don’t really provide arguments for it either? Feature parity does not provide an upside.)

[SuM-EM]

Just a small request. I know that we already have some of the annotating features in SumatraPDF, but the extensive feature (highlight, underline, commenting) is in the beta version. If it is possible to put it into the stable release, it would be great. Beta versions do not integrate well with Texmaker, that's one of the downsides. I don't want to update often but the beta version requires me to update frequently. Thanks. Keep up the good work 👍

[GitHubRulesOK]

@SuM-erb
The "beta" Pre-release will potentially be in next stable, but as to when will that be, that depends on level of stability.
You don't need to update daily or many times a day like I might.
Once every second Tuesday :-) just before MS updates should be good enough if you need to restore the system

[kjk]

If pre-release version doesn't integrate with Texmaker then that's a bug and you should file an issue with details.

The issue will not go away in released version because released version is the exact same thing as pre-release. At some point I'll just decide that this pre-release is good enough to be released.

[GitHubRulesOK]

I wrote that a long time ago when using portable LaTeX with many editors but still cant remember why I singled that line out for %% as I did not for others :puzzled: I am! sometime I should re-edit.

[SuM-EM]

Thanks so much! For solving my issue. Sorry for the deleted comment.
Sometimes re-editing kills many bugs :D

[SuM-EM]

Now, if I close Texmaker, it closes SumatraPDF as well. After I have reopened everything, it shows me "no synchronization info at this point". After I have freshly compiled it, it shows me that "synchronization info cannot be opened". :(
Edit: I closed both the SumatraPDF and TexMaker. Given that SumatraPDF is my default viewer, double-clicking the PDF file opens that PDF file. If I click on the PDF document TexMaker opens, highlighting the appropriate paragraph. If I recompile, I again get "synchronization info cannot be opened" (but the changes made in the latex file are reflected). If I click on SumatraPDF, it shows "synchronization info cannot be opened".

[GitHubRulesOK]

no synchronization info at this point means exactly that, you are in a void area that does not match any editor object, the sample seems to be fully covered on all of the whole page so I cant find a void spot in that file.

The compiled file must have succeed without any synctex error and the new synctex file match the new PDF e.g. the sample files are the same time and date. Thus check the times of new.tex new.pdf and new.synctex(.gz) are not out of sync in time and look in the new.log if they do not match.

A common problem is users do not heed the expert advice to only have all project files in one folder (no output / auxiliary sub chapter folders) the inter-relationships of dozens of modules in LaTeX depend on one common working directory whilst compiling (or else an exceedingly good understanding of how environmental variables can point to common related resources like images and fonts).

At this stage we are off topic as SumatraPDF itself is not apparently the issue. But it seems to be the synctex file it is being asked to use. There is a slight possibility the file is not suited to SumatraPDF legacy reading but I suspect it is more likely not being written as a valid synctex file

[SuM-EM]

I don't understand much about what you said, but I truly appreciate your effort. Please note that the stable release has no such issue. As I said, I wanted those nice annotation features, which is why I am using the beta version of SumatraPDF. Thanks anyway.

[GitHubRulesOK]

@kjk TexMaker (written by Kile author) and other IDEs like TexWorks should have their own PdfLaTeX previewer but many Windows users prefer SumatraPDF rather than native viewer or Okular for Windows. The problem can be the need to reconfigure if the locations change, but that is easily addressed by good IDE configuration the tex support in SumatraPDF e.g. synctex -inverse calling and -reuseinstance should not have changed (AFAIK)

[SuM-EM]

TexMaker has its own reader, but I don't use it simply for convenience. :D

[GitHubRulesOK]

@SuM-erb
We have seen some occasional problems 🙁with LaTeX.synctex.gz reversed search in the official 64bit release 3.4.0 - 3.4.3 that should now be cleared in official 3.4.4 https://www.sumatrapdfreader.org/download-free-pdf-viewer

[devenriq]

Hi community 🙂. Is there any chance to add a in-build dictionary to the reader?. Similarly to the kindle one

[GitHubRulesOK]

@devpcastello
It is unlikely to be added as much baggage for minority of files, PDF does not generally have words, in reality those are with luck line strings of searchable characters that often have errors in underlying text components and many PDF etc are not text based

There is the use external or custom online dictionary methods of selection and many windows executable dictionary plug-ins work well with SumatraPDF

[NameUserIII]

Hello,
I really liked "SumatraPDF" on windows and it had all I wanted :)
Now I am trying to use "windows" as little as possible with a thought to completely abandon it - I know that "SumatraPDF" is available on snaps, but I am "fedora" user and I do not like snaps (they are slow) it would be amazing for it to appear as flatpak as well. :)
Thank you :)

[GitHubRulesOK]

SumatraPDF needs to be run slowly in any emulator
Normally run in WinE(mulation) but totally untested/UN-SUn-apP-PORTED
See #260

[kjk]

I wouldn't know how to add Sumatra to flatpak. I assume someone is in charge of deciding what is available in flatpak on fedora - you would have to convince them.

[NameUserIII]

I wonder if it is emulated or made to run locally on snaps?

It runs quite well with Wine or Bottles (actually quite slow with bottles (sandboxed) and Linux community is saying that Wine decreasing security of a system and it is better not to have wine installed directly).

Also I noticed that program is not pulling settings from file next to program, but from file located in AppData/Local/ Sumatra... and it modifies it each time program is launched. If I disable write function then it can not remember files opened. Would it not be better if file located in ..AppData just served as a "memory file" and a "settings file" separated in folder where program resides?

[GitHubRulesOK]

@NameUserIII
the official (this site) portable is a portable version and should not need porting to use same directory for settings, if its using local appdata its an installed or modified install that requires a windows registry to function correctly, thus not designed for porting.

In any case if its official build using -appdata (portable or installed) can be used to set settings folder.

[Hugoalv79]

1 request: Allow create & edit bookmarks.

I'm software developer too, so maybe i can help you with this.

[GitHubRulesOK]

@Hugoalv79
its not to difficult but time consuming to get it right here is a very simple example as a text file you can edit it in notepad https://github.com/GitHubRulesOK/MyNotes/raw/master/demo.pdf look at how the bookmarks are added at runtime they dont need to follow any order but must be correctly nested.
it starts with setting the root for all 3 bookmarks

4 0 obj
<</Count 2/First 7 0 R/Last 9 0 R>>

and we can start off with the first last entry

%09) Outline / Bookmark entry 3 
9 0 obj
...

Now SumatraPDF can only append those bookmarks by altering the trailer of the file but a full editor would inject bookmarks wherever it wishes. so the simplest way to add bookmarks to an existing PDF is use a full editor to export and import those bookmarks and thats usually done with a CLI like PDFTK

[Haplo-dBiggs]

Is it possible to set the default paper size in the settings? My understanding is that A4 paper is more common outside of USA which uses Letter, and having to change the size every time I print is a (somewhat) minor hassle, but still annoying. Maybe in the settings text file (SumatraPDF-settings.txt) have something to set the default paper size so that "PaperSize = Letter", or whatever, can be changed to "PaperSize = A4" and allow the print sizes already allowed by the drop menu inside the printer advanced settings.

[GitHubRulesOK]

@Haplo-dBiggs
The default for printing should be the current system printer default which can change minute by minute if you let windows manage printing. mine is currently A4P but often I set mine to A4L or for a fax printer it will be imperial.

The default for current page in a document is fixed and cannot be changed by SumatraPDF

[ThermoMan]

I can't create a canny.io account just now....

I have several PDFs that I have to open in Firefox because it will show me the layers. I'd prefer to not have to remember which document has to open in what reader.

Here is an online example of a document with layers. sorry, it's the only reference I could find in a hurry.

http://www.mad-irishman.net/pubs/MI_Meriga2471ADMap.pdf

[GitHubRulesOK]

Hmm in my "Powered by Acrobat " Edge Viewer I cant see any Layers just a Map

I would need to export to an editor to change appearance or use an Adobe product, like heavyweight DC Reader Editor.

[ThermoMan]

Yeah, I only have a few PDFs that need to be opened in Firefox. I guess layers are not a popular feature. But it sure would be handy. My present work around it to rename the file to "ORIGINAL NAME (open in Firefox).PDF"

[GitHubRulesOK]

Well you could call Firefox as an externalviewer same as Edge Foxit PDFXedit (my preference) with the current filename however you would need to know or suspect there were layers in the first place

[ThermoMan]

I can try it. It at least solves the "use Sumatra" and is an easier work around than my present method. But the caveat that you pointed out (of having to suspect there is more to a file than first meets the eye) is why I put in the feature request. If Sumatra just shows me the layers that would be the ideal solution. :D

I'll follow the example in the docs for now.
https://www.sumatrapdfreader.org/docs/Customize-external-viewers

[ThermoMan]

Thanks for the tip by the way, that was painless to set up.

[neail001]

[GitHubRulesOK]

@neail001
nightmare mode is a system setting MS call it Night Light

to change all colours so as to reduce harmfully blue light. you will find that bottom right of screen.
SumatraPDF for as long as I can remember has view negatives or blueprint or images as inverted
Also commands for initial colour settings (command line too) so you could have the old bright yellow background or any thing like black text on black background no problems, other than need xray monitor to see a difference.

The following options just set values in the settings file and may be removed in any future version:
-bg-color : changes the yellow background color to a different color. See e.g. html-color-codes.info for a way to generate the hexcode for a color. E.g. -bg-color #999999 changes the color to gray. [Deprecated]: Use MainWindowBackground setting instead.
-set-color-range : Uses the given two colors for foreground and background and maps all other colors used in a document in between these two. E.g. -set-color-range #dddddd #333333 displays soft white text on a dark gray background. [Deprecated]: Use the TextColor and BackgroundColor settings for FixedPageUI instead.

The toggle is between U and O on most keyboards

[neail001]

Hi, just found out the text document under advance settings allows for Inversion and Background colour (it's the document background, not UI).
Inversion has a shortcut "I".

It's great, but a toggle could bring a little more accessible solution.

[neail001]

I am removing the feature request as it works for now. Not the fancy but works.

[howlettwv]

Modern UI FTW.

[iozuniga]

My vote:

I wish the PDF preview from the print screen worked

[StevieGeorge]

I'm a heavy user of text selection, in particular double-click-drag. I also often like to use shift-arrow keys or ctrl-shift-arrow to expand the selection. I find the above are not implemented in SumatraPDF, and I would love them!
Ctrl-click-drag boxes also include a carriage return. I understand it is technically in the selection, but it's generally not desired when selecting a single line of text.

[GitHubRulesOK]

double click drag etc. has clearly bee mentioned many times by others and double click is heavily assigned to so many functions it is a selection problem as to what action will be following. So was recently changed in a fullscreen where I feel was counter productive to the historic word selection for opening position in synchronised editor (even though that was not perfectly carried out per character in synctex!).

As for line feeds there are none however the lines returned in a clipboard will have added them, this is the same for the majority of PDF textractors. Each letter in a PDF has a position so if the positions are character 1 in a line it is presumed there must be a carriage return AND new line needed before that letter, or else it would overlay the letter on the line before.

[StevieGeorge]

Hi there @GitHubRulesOK, I'm glad you're helping with SumatraPDF, but I'm not reporting an issue, this is the "Vote for features!" thread. I could not find any other comments here that mention double click drag. I would like to vote for this feature, because to me personally it is much more valuable than any other double-click feature.
If that's impossible, I would like to vote for better text selection in general- currently, it is hard to select text at all, as the cursor must be placed carefully within the text to work. I think most users make text selections from outside the lines.
Separately, I would like to vote for triple-click paragraph selection. I am not aware that there is any other feature in use for triple-click.

[GitHubRulesOK]

Hi @StevieGeorge
There have been several suggestions as to text selection but it is not easy in PDF format as at the working face inside a PDF there is no consistency like you would find in a conventional Text Processor format such as Doc or HTML. That treat characters as parts of words or paragraphs. However PDF is like a graph of numbers which are then assigned values for font entries that draw shapes that look like letters.

Thus you could write reams of code, for one PDF and find it produces garbage in another PDF from a different source. ISO PDF is never standard between two variations !! Adobe defined the Myriad Font and a Myriad of possible PDF constructs. Thus are well positioned to untangle their wooly format in a slower rate of viewer. Even Acrobat at times will struggle with non Adobe PDFs. Here is a very small plaintext PDF so how hard could it be, Acrobat reader does fairly good but out of order and said nein to 9.
https://github.com/GitHubRulesOK/MyNotes/raw/master/AppNotes/Abracadabra2.pdf

Acrobat assistive reader

Sign and Secure this file.txt as a PDF with Adobe Reader 
or click https://www.adobe.com/acrobat/online/sign-pdf.html 
(Unsigned signature field (Click to sign)) Signature field is unsigned
PlainText = http://foersom.com/net/HowTo/data/OoPdfFormExample.pdf 

12 letters. 

letters. 

Abracadabra 

goto page in another PDF 

Also plain text = https://pdfobject.com/pdf/sample-3pp.pdf#page=2 



Acrobat via graphics selection does see the 9 but changes the order

PlainText = http://foersom.com/net/HowTo/data/OoPdfFormExample.pdf
12 letters.
9 letters.
Abracadabra
goto page in another PDF
Also plain text = https://pdfobject.com/pdf/sample-3pp.pdf#page=2
Sign and Secure this file.txt as a PDF with Adobe Reader
or click https://www.adobe.com/acrobat/online/sign-pdf.html

SumatraPDF by select area is actually more correct as this is how Abracadabra was injected as numeric entries !

PlainText = http://foersom.com/net/HowTo/data/OoPdfFormExample.pdf
12 letters.
9
letters.
A
a a a
a
b
b
c d
r
r
goto page in another PDF
Also plain text = https://pdfobject.com/pdf/sample-3pp.pdf#page=2
Sign and Secure this file.txt as a PDF with Adobe Reader
or click https://www.adobe.com/acrobat/online/sign-pdf.html

Thus you cant without analysis Double Click the Abracadabra as a word like you might be able to do with other letter groups. also see the difference between selecting the 12 letters line and the 9 letters line so PDF sees 2 different constructs.

[kjk]

@StevieGeorge To vote for features:

• go to https://sumatrapdf.canny.io/feature-requests
• find the relevant feature request and vote for it
• if feature request doesn't exist, create it
• only one feature / idea per post

Also, create relevant issues at https://github.com/sumatrapdfreader/sumatrapdf/issues

Discussions and ephemeral.

Issues are for tracking bug reports and feature requests so that they are not forgotten and you will get notified if it gets fixed / implemented.

[Birador]

[GitHubRulesOK]

Annotations are additive (incremental writing) so each delete adds more to a file, by duplicating previous object with a negated one, Nothing to do with SumatraPDF but the way PDF was designed as an extensible editing format. It can thus be a problem defining the point in the stack of edits that starts a new chain of overlays. If you used a true delete all the extras would be removed thus even undo the last few needs all that session be removed to rollback to last save (so only save as infrequent as practical) . Editing a PDF is a fragile task at the best of times. Applications like Adobe Reader and MS Edge are under the surface a full PDF editor and totally re-write of the PDF so there is no simple way to adjust the annotations as usually "flattened" into the file.

[yshplsngh]

The current smooth scrolling feature is not working well. Improving the scrolling behavior would be a great feature.

[GitHubRulesOK]

@yshplsngh
there has been A LOT of work recently on addressing pinch and scrolling so please do ensure you are using todays pre-release for comparison. 16134 is available from https://www.sumatrapdfreader.org/prerelease

[Dragon3166]

what will make use sumatra pdf as defult reader if it had option to add bookmarks to pdfs , thats one thing i like to see option add bookmarks to pdf files

[GitHubRulesOK]

@Dragon3166
To add bookmarks into the guts of a pdf it has to be fairly heavily edited.

Whilst the bookmarks could be appended as easy as annotation. The fact that PDF files can be rights protected with encryption means it is NOT an easy task for a reader rather than full blown editor. MuPDF reader and its tool(s) do not have such a complex function without you design scripts to change the file contents. There are java and other based scripting (even cmd) that may try to do similar such as Sejda editor.

[ThermoMan]

Perhaps create a sidecar file for the PDF with the settings/bookmarks in it?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidecar_file

[GitHubRulesOK]

@ThermoMan 😁 that was done (See VBKM in the issues) but dropped as hard to maintain with so many different source formats. it did work "fairly" well (I used it heavily in a project at the time) but was not reliable for production !

[dev1312000]

This software is very minimalist and I run it in dozens of devices in my family and friends. One option I would like to request is basic shape to draw such as rectangle, line, arrow and circles. It is great for showing specific parts to someone in pdf.

[dev1312000]

First of all, Thank you for making such an amazing lightweight PDF reader! I love you for that.
The feature I loved the most is its ability to remember even large set of books.

Future features I would like you to add if possible are :

1. Ability to produce basic shape such as Arrow, Rectangle, ellipse
2. When writing the comment, it opens a separate which lingers here and there when I have multiple screens. Would really like to just type the comment and save immediately without opening any separate window.
3. A menu in the reader which is togglable to show shortcuts defined. I really read 15 to 20 PDFs at a time and operate many other software together with it. Switching from other software sometimes confuses the shortcut I use. This little aid is really useful.

This recommendations are just biased according to the community of people like me who read too many books and have no options to use any other PDF readers at all because all of them have problems with remembering which pdf were open. And our computer sometimes shut down because of much load on CPU or sometimes low battery. If I just forgot which 20 books were open before it shut down, I have to go through all my collections to remember it and it is literally a time waste.

I Would sincerely like to thank you for this amazing features it contain at such smaller size. would never like to spoil it more with too many features. It is just perfect as it is with some feature I mentioned missing.