SYSTEM INFO:
Obsidian version: v1.0.3
Installer version: v1.0.3
Operating system: Darwin Kernel Version 21.6.0: Mon Aug 22 20:17:10 PDT 2022; root:xnu-8020.140.49~2/RELEASE_X86_64 21.6.0
Login status: logged in
Catalyst license: supporter
Insider build toggle: on
Live preview: on
Legacy editor: off
Base theme: dark
Community theme: none
Snippets enabled: 10
Restricted mode: off
Plugins installed: 24
Plugins enabled: 19
1: Advanced Tables v0.17.3
2: Breadcrumbs v3.6.4
3: Calendar v1.5.10
4: Contextual Typography v2.2.4
5: Copy Block Link v1.0.4
6: Dataview v0.5.47
7: Day Planner v0.5.8
8: Excalidraw v1.7.27
9: Local images v0.14.2
10: Enhancing Mindmap v0.2.4
11: Number Headings v1.10.0
12: Obsidian42 - BRAT v0.6.36
13: Outliner v4.1.1
14: Pandoc Plugin v0.4.1
15: Query Control v0.5.0
16: Smart Random Note v0.2.1
17: Style Settings v0.4.12
18: Templater v1.15.3
19: Kanban v1.5.1
RECOMMENDATIONS:
Custom theme and snippets: for cosmetic issues, please first try updating your theme and disabling your snippets. If still not fixed, please try to make the issue happen in the Sandbox Vault or disable community theme and snippets.
Community plugins: for bugs, please first try updating all your plugins to latest. If still not fixed, please try to make the issue happen in the Sandbox Vault or disable community plugins.
Additional information
Notice that the Chinese in the text label can be shown correctly.
You were clear in number 1. I misread. The original annotation was created in Preview.app on macOS.
edit: I tried with your “你好 世界 Hello world” as well as some mixed English and Japanese. I get the same result: 文字化け(corrupted text). Standard English characters seem OK, but an ö in Preview shows up as ¶ for me in Obsidian’s PDF viewer.
A macOS issue? A Preview.app issue with how non-English annotations are encoded/saved in the PDF? Obsidian? Lots of possible causes and probably tricky to track down.
Would be a good idea to change the post title to something more descriptive.
I also tried the PDF Expert. The comments created in that app corrupts as well.
The mess code issue in the old days used to be related with the encoding and decoding process. If this is still the cause, i think the built-in pdf viewer fails to recognize the CJK characters as UTF-8 in the comments.
I tried using Windows 11 and the Workintool PDF app to add a note to a PDF. I put Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and German in a PDF annotation note. Saved. Reopened. Looks fine in that app.
Opening the PDF in Edge or Vivaldi (Chromium) shows garbled text.
I would bet on an encoding problem. Don’t think there’s anything the Obsidian team can do about it.
I misread. The original annotation was created in Preview.app on macOS.
