I've a nice simple piece of code that pulls some information out of a pdf file: 
#!/path/bin/perl
use Data::Dumper;
use PDF::API2;
use Encode;
my $dir = '/tmp/';
my $file = $dir.'test.pdf';

my $pdf = PDF::API2->open($file);
my %info = $pdf->info;
print Dumper(%info);
foreach my $key (sort keys %info) {
  print "$key ->";
  print decode("utf8", $info{$key});
  print "\n";
}

[download]
Everything is installed, and the code runs. Data Dumper prints out: 
$VAR1 = 'CreationDate';
$VAR2 = 'D:20060817180621+01\'00\'';
$VAR3 = 'Producer';
$VAR4 = "\x{4f00}\x{7000}\x{6500}\x{6e00}\x{4f00}\x{6600}\x{6600}\x{69
+00}\x{6300}\x{6500}\x{2e00}\x{6f00}\x{7200}\x{6700}\x{2000}\x{3200}\x
+{2e00}\x{3000}";
$VAR5 = 'Creator';
$VAR6 = "\x{5700}\x{7200}\x{6900}\x{7400}\x{6500}\x{7200}";
$VAR7 = 'Author';
$VAR8 = "\x{4200}\x{6f00}\x{6200}\x{2000}\x{5700}\x{6500}\x{6200}\x{73
+00}\x{7400}\x{6500}\x{7200}";
$VAR9 = 'Title';
$VAR10 = "\x{4300}\x{4f00}\x{4d00}\x{5000}\x{4500}\x{5400}\x{4900}\x{5
+400}\x{4900}\x{5600}\x{4500}\x{2000}\x{5300}\x{4100}\x{4600}\x{4100}\
+x{5200}\x{4900}";

[download]
but decode barfs with "Cannot decode string with wide characters"

(The pdf file was created by exporting an OpenOffice file {.doc format on disk} to pdf.)

I have tested this under Solaris and Fedora Core 5.
Solaris is running with Perl 5.8.3 and Encode 1.99
FC5 is running Perl 5.8.8 and and Encode 2.09 (downgraded from Encode 2.18)

Has anyone got a setup that will handle the UTF-8 (as present in pdfs... all pdfs..?)


-- Ian Stuart
A man depriving some poor village, somewhere, of a first-class idiot.

In reply to Decoding UTF-8 - "Cannot decode string with wide characters" by kiz

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