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  1. 10-18-2011, 06:09 PM #1
    loremipsum is offline

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    Question WEIRD! Parentheses turn into alien heads when copy/pasting from scientific articles
    This is a problem I have found when trying to copy and paste text from a PDF (usually a scientific article) into a plain text editor like TextEdit or Notational Velocity.


    This picture sort of speaks for itself.



    Now this doesn't happen all the time with all PDFs, but when it does I notice a few patterns. For example....





    Intriguing! Can anyone help me solve this puzzle?





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  2. 10-18-2011, 07:10 PM #2
    RavingMac is offline

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    Obviously you've broken the code, and now THEY will be coming for you!


    Funny and strange . . . thanks for sharing.
    I've always wanted to be smart, handsome and modest. But, I guess I'll have to be satisfied with two out of three . . .
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  3. 10-18-2011, 07:23 PM #3
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    I was going to help - but then made the mistake of reading part of the source article...and only just now woke back up.

    I didn't look hard - but only found one similarly described problem Adobe: Acrobat - Adobe Acrobat Pro Can't Copy and Paste? Maybe that guy can tell you what he found?

    It must be an encoding issue of some kind.
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  4. 10-18-2011, 07:27 PM #4
    BrianLachoreVPI is offline

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    Here you go Aliens on my screen!!!
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  5. 10-18-2011, 09:39 PM #5
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  6. 10-18-2011, 09:46 PM #6
    loremipsum is offline

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    Quote Originally Posted by BrianLachoreVPI View Post
    I was going to help - but then made the mistake of reading part of the source article...and only just now woke back up.
    I think part of my immense drive to get to the bottom of this aliens issue must come from wanting to do ANYTHING I can to procrastinate reading more of these papers.

    "Whoops, I was going to be productive today but I can't. Aliens."
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  7. 10-18-2011, 09:48 PM #7
    loremipsum is offline

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    Quote Originally Posted by BrianLachoreVPI View Post
    Here you go Aliens on my screen!!!
    Interesting...so it's a Unicode issue. But, alas, how to fix it?
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  8. 10-19-2011, 06:28 AM #8
    RavingMac is offline

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    Interesting!

    The aliens appear to have gotten wise to this thread, as my reply now is now the first post. Anyone who reads this will wonder what we are talking about.
    I've always wanted to be smart, handsome and modest. But, I guess I'll have to be satisfied with two out of three . . .
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  9. 10-19-2011, 03:14 PM #9
    loremipsum is offline

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    Quote Originally Posted by Razormac View Post
    Interesting!

    The aliens appear to have gotten wise to this thread, as my reply now is now the first post. Anyone who reads this will wonder what we are talking about.
    It looks like its on the bottom to me--maybe it fixed itself.

    Yesterday afternoon I edited the post and put the enlarged alien head picture on it. My entire post promptly vanished, along with the buttons that would have allowed me to edit it.

    Today it is back, so I guess They must have just borrowed it temporarily for some routine probing.
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  10. 10-19-2011, 04:42 PM #10
    RavingMac is offline

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    Quote Originally Posted by loremipsum View Post
    it looks like its on the bottom to me--maybe it fixed itself.

    Yesterday afternoon i edited the post and put the enlarged alien head picture on it. My entire post promptly vanished, along with the buttons that would have allowed me to edit it.

    Today it is back, so i guess they must have just borrowed it temporarily for some routine probing.
    lol
    I've always wanted to be smart, handsome and modest. But, I guess I'll have to be satisfied with two out of three . . .
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  11. 10-19-2011, 11:02 PM #11
    _Stormin is offline

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    No clue what the heck is up, but I sure want to try it on my own system...
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