PDF formatting issues in Seattle

Hey there.

I put together a quote in Excel, saved it as a PDF, and sent it over to a client. Now the client is calling me up saying they can't see the full proposal when they open the PDF inside Seattle. They can see the text, but some line items are just missing. I checked the preview in my own Seattle and I’m seeing the exact same thing. If I open that same PDF in a web browser, everything looks perfect—all the items show up exactly as intended. Everything is perfectly visible in my original Excel file, too.

Has anyone dealt with something like this before? I'm starting to lose my mind a little bit here.😵

Thanks!

Timothy Phillips3 said:Hey there!

So, I put together a quote in Excel, saved it as a PDF, and sent it over because the client asked for it. Now the client calls me up saying they can't see the full thing when they open the PDF inside Seattle. They say the text shows up, but only some of the line items—not all of them. I checked it on my end using the Seattle preview, and yeah, it looks just as broken for me. But then, I open that exact same PDF in a web browser, and everything looks perfect. All the items are right there. And obviously, everything is perfectly visible in my original Excel file too.

Anyone ever deal with something like this? Honestly, I'm starting to lose my mind a little bit here. 😵

Thanks!

You should always just open documents with their actual dedicated software.

Just save the attachment to a local folder, right-click, and select "Open with" to pick the right app. That way you bypass all that Windows nonsense.

Use Acrobat Reader for PDFs, use Excel or Word for Office docs, and use a proper image viewer—like Photoshop, GIMP, or IrfanView—for any kind of picture.

Of course, if Windows actually manages to get it right on its own, hey, even better.

John Cook72 said:You really ought to be using the right software for the job when opening documents. It’s not just about convenience; it's about doing things correctly from the start.

Just save the attachment to a local folder. Right-click it, select "Open with," and pick the app you actually want to use. It's better to just bypass all that macOS nonsense.

I open PDFs using Adobe Acrobat Reader. For anything related to Microsoft 365, I stick to Word or Google Sheets. As for images, I just use whatever standard photo viewer is handy, or maybe jump into something like GIMP or Photoshop if I need to get serious.

Sure, if even macOS manages to stumble onto the right answer, then we're all in trouble.

I’m with you on that. I just open all my PDFs directly in Chrome. If anyone else runs into this headache down the road, here’s the deal: the issue was that Gmail wasn't loading everything correctly. You’d get some text, but large chunks would just be missing. When I opened the file in Chrome, everything appeared perfectly on the first try. Open it through Gmail, though, and it’s a total mess—half the text is visible, half isn't. If you force the document to open in Gmail a second or third time, it eventually catches up and displays properly, but that’s a hassle nobody needs. That was my explanation to the client. They said the fix worked, but they still decided they’d rather just use Adobe Acrobat Reader from now on. 🙂