Troubleshooting Renditions

This troubleshooting guide helps with issues that occur when generating viewable renditions of documents. See the renditions overview to add or remove renditions from your Vault. Follow these steps to troubleshoot your rendition issues:

Step 1: Re-render Your Document

Re-rendering your document may correct any errors that occur when Vault creates a viewable rendition of your document. From the Actions menu in the Document Viewer, select Re-render Document to have Vault generate another viewable rendition of your document. This replaces the current version of the rendition. Based on the rendition error message received, choose one or more of the options below to generate a new viewable rendition using different settings. After selecting an option and re-rendering, additional options appear if you decide to re-render again.

Images and/or colors are not appearing correctly in the viewer.

This option attempts to re-render the document seen in the document viewer using a different engine.

The viewer is taking a long time to load the first page of the document.

This option reduces the wait time to view documents with overlay and signature pages outside of Vault.

My table of contents, reference fields, and/or captions are not appearing correctly or have incorrect data.

This option attempts to re-render with fields locked.

I am using non-standard fonts and different people are seeing inconsistencies in my document (fonts, letters, or symbols). This option applies full font embedding.

This option applies full font embedding.

I am not seeing the proper symbols or letters in my document (®, ©,™, ¥, ê, š, ß, etc.), or I am seeing inconsistent font weight (light/bold) or blurry fonts. This document is not for submission.

This option applies subset font embedding.

I am having issues with characters not rendering properly and/or extra spaces and blank pages are appearing in my email.

This option attempts to re-render using a different engine.

My DateTime fields are not reflecting the current DateTime.

This option attempts to re-render with fields unlocked.

When using “Download with Annotations” my document looks like it has been cropped.

This option attempts to re-render a PDF with annotations using a different engine.

I am using standard fonts (Times New Roman, Arial, and Courier) and have issues with file size being too large and/or it is not for distribution.

This option applies default font embedding.

Additionally, you can alter rendition settings for specific document formats from the Actions menu. For example, Word Rendition Settings displays if your source file is in Microsoft Word format. Changing these settings generates a new viewable rendition.

Step 2: Check Source File Requirements

Limitations on source files are often a cause of rendition issues. Use this checklist to ensure that your source file does not violate any of the requirements.

  • Video source files must be 100 GB or less in size. Navigate to About Video Playback for details on how to upload video renditions.
  • Source files that are zero (0) bytes in size cannot be uploaded.
  • Vault cannot create viewable renditions for source files that use password protection to control view access in Microsoft Office.
  • In order to upload renditions of any type, you must have access to the Edit Fields permission. To replace existing renditions by uploading a file, you must have access to the Manage Viewable Renditions permission. Ask your Vault administrator for access to these permissions.
  • Vault may not render multiple-page files with more than 4000 pages.

For a list of acceptable file formats that generate viewable renditions, refer to Supported File Formats.

Step 3: Check List of Workarounds

This list offers workarounds for more specific issues that may occur while generating viewable renditions.

Document Format Workarounds

DEV-176476: TIFF Image with layers displays as multiple pages (one for each layer) upon rendering.
Vault cannot distinguish between layers and pages for TIFF source files. Flatten the TIFF file manually before uploading.
DEV-169432: XLSX Source files fail to render.
Reduce the number of cells in the source file, and attempt rendition again.
DEV-184788: Font in rendition looks different than source file when source file uses Type 1 fonts in Adobe InDesign files.
Avoid using Type 1 fonts.
DEV-168052, DEV-180049: Font rendered differs from source file font.
Specify explicit fonts and styles in the source file. Avoid using default fonts.
DEV-186736: PDF documents with Vault-overlay do not display in Chrome PDF viewer and crash when viewed in Acrobat.
Recreate the source file using a different application (Word, Google Docs, among others).
DEV-175055: Some DOCX files with fields have their text modified after rendition generation.
Enable lock fields in MS Word or with the re-rendering option, or update the fields before uploading the source file.
DEV-190395: PDF source files with embedded Javascript do not render, display correctly, or are missing from the Document Viewer.
Vault does not support Javascript dependencies. Recreate the source file without Javascript dependencies, or remove Javascript using Acrobat.
DEV-189747: Upon rendering, DOCX source files’ headers and footers are not displayed correctly.
Either lock header and/or footer fields, or update the fields manually before uploading.
DEV-202811: INDD files created with Adobe Indesign 2018 or later fail to render.
When saving INDD files, configure options to enable backwards compatibility with older versions of Indesign.
DEV-206401, DEV-206077: Vault fails to apply Overlays to renditions of PDF files with password security or fails to render the PDF file entirely.
Upload an unprotected version of the document.
DEV-210949: INDD files with incomplete linked resources appear distorted and/or low in quality after rendering.
Refer to About Adobe InDesign Package Rendering to ensure that your file is configured properly.
DEV-211136: Vault fails to render PPTX files with an embedded EMF image.
Delete the object corresponding to the embedded EMF file and attempt to render again.
DEV-207910, DEV-207683: MS Word and PowerPoint files with proprietary fonts do not render properly.
Use an embedded version of the font or a different font.
DEV-171551: Vault cuts off rows and/or columns in rendered XLSX files with configured print areas.
Readjust the print area on your spreadsheet to include all the cells you want Vault to render.
DEV-212150: PDF files fail to render due to Vault timing out.
Caused by internal formatting issues with the PDF file. Re-print the file as a PDF, then upload to Vault.
DEV-217670: Japanese text in XLSX files wraps differently in generated renditions.
Add padding in Excel sheets to account for potential sizing differences between locales. Additionally, check the document under the US locale to confirm spacing is acceptable before uploading.
DEV-218284: Shapes with gradient fills in PPTX files do not render as expected.
Edit the shape in the source document, ensuring that gradient stops are separated by at least 1%.
DEV-228087, DEV-228534: Rendition has reversed ≤ and ≥ characters, or otherwise differs from the downloaded rendition viewed in Microsoft Word.
Convert the document to DOCX and re-upload. Ensure that the layout, spacing, and characters are consistent with your expectations.
DEV-229181, DEV-242607: PPTX slides with speaker notes may not render as expected, potentially with shifted, missing, or unexpected content.
Microsoft Powerpoint allows adjustment of speaker note slides independent of content slides. Ensure that the speaker note slides are formatted as expected after rendering. If you have removed the slide placeholder in the notes view, you will need to revert to an older version of the source document.
DEV-256287: Font used for Asian text (for example, Japanese) does not render as expected, and differs from the local source file.
Set the font as the East Asian version. For example, for Japanese text that uses a mix of Cambria and MS PGothic, set the font to be MS PGothic instead of Cambria. Alternately, set the styling for the text portions individually, so that English remains Cambria and the Japanese text is MS PGothic.
DEV-169493, DEV-169446, DEV-167712, DEV-159949, DEV-184239: Linked images do not render properly and are replaced by a gray placeholder image.
Remove or unlink the affected images.

Links & Bookmarks

DEV-167696: Additional links appear after rendering DOCX files.
Remove clipped text in headers and footers.
DEV-187011: After editing a checked out item, some merge fields are not applied upon check-in and re-rendering.
Avoid manually modifying special fields such as DOCVARIABLE.
DEV-178516: Bookmarks are not rendered properly or are missing after rendering DOCX files.
Ensure that the Table of Contents on the source file does not contain hyperlinks. If it does, remove them and attempt to upload the source file again. Additionally, ensure that “Use Hyperlinks Instead of Page Numbers” is enabled.
DEV-175694: External links in DOCX source files fail to render.
Change external links to manual and attempt to upload the document again.
DEV-177057: Some DOC files that contain hyphens in titles do not display as bookmarks.
Ensure your hyphens are not non-breaking hyphens. Replace non-breaking hyphens with regular dash symbols, or the Unicode version (u2011).
DEV-216559: Vault renders XLSX files with Japanese date formats in the US date format.
Use the region code [$-ja-JP] when formatting the cell’s date.
DEV-194984, DEV-253444: Normal text adjacent to blue link text in DOCX files inappropriately changes to blue as well.
Manually add spaces around adjacent characters for padding. If using an Asian language setting: In paragraph properties, disable “Automatically adjust space between Asian and Latin text” and “Automatically adjust space between Asian text and numbers”.

Merge Fields

DEV-166605, DEV-190477, DEV-180075: Merge field tokens are not rendered. Rendered source file has shifted text and/or more pages in DOCX files with hidden text.
Upgrade the token to point to a valid item. Remove hidden text or set it to visible.
DEV-167525: Merge field tokens are not rendered.
Remove or unlink the affected tokens and attempt to upload again.
DEV-164857, DEV-210858: Some DOCX files with linked files and merged fields do not have merged fields applied upon rendering.
Remove any linked files from the document and attempt to render again. If the linked files are charts, try replacing them with screenshots.
DEV-204297: Vault does not apply merge fields or takes a long time to render DOCX files with merge fields.
Some sections appear to have several more merge fields than intended. Vault attempts to render all fields, causing a slowdown. Replace sections containing extraneous merge fields with regular text, then upload again.
DEV-182486: Vault renders the number of pages token blank or incorrect for DOCX files with merge fields that utilize the pages__v field.
Render the document twice to update the field value. Alternatively, use MS Word’s “# of pages” field instead of pages__v.
DEV-218028: Vault does not populate merge field tokens in DOCX files with content copied from another file.
Avoid copy-pasting content when working with merge fields. Create duplicate documents in order to preserve metadata.

OCR

DEV-176464: OCR does not detect the correct number of words in JPG, GIF, and other lossy image files.
Use a lossless image file, or use an image with a higher quality setting.
DEV-204536: Vault cannot detect text during OCR in a PNG file that has been rotated.
Rotate the file to display vertically (portrait) or horizontally (landscape) for the best detection quality.

Other

DEV-168605: Rendered video length is different than source file length.
Ensure that metadata on the source file is correct.
DEV-169030: Signature and Overlay tokens are configured with new lines upon rendering.
Do not include new lines in the tokens used in signature headers and footers.
DEV-209489: Overlays fail to match up with an advanced overlay template.
Ensure that the dimensions of your PDF file are 8.5×11 and attempt to render again.
DEV-284661: Vault does not display attachments in uploaded MSG files.
Once the viewable rendition is generated, you must refresh the Doc Info page to display any included attachments.
DEV-278300: Vault does not apply the expected overlay upon downloading the file.
Upon downloading, Vault may not apply overlays to files exceeding 100 MB or 1000 pages. Reduce the size or length of the file.

Step 4: File a Support Ticket

If you are still experiencing rendition issues after following the above steps, contact your Admin to file a support ticket with Veeva Support.

The following permissions are required when working with renditions.

Security Profile

Document: Download Rendition
Controls ability to download renditions of any type, including viewable renditions.
Vault Owner Actions: Re-render
Controls ability to re-render a document without the Manage Viewable Rendition document role permission.
Vault Owner Actions: Power Delete
Controls ability to delete a viewable rendition that has annotations. Yhis is necessary to turn off the Preserve my annotations setting when re-rendering any viewable rendition that includes annotations.

Document Role

View Content
Controls ability to view and download renditions of any type, including viewable renditions.
View Document
Controls ability to view document fields, settings, and metadata.
Edit Fields
Controls ability to upload and delete renditions of any type other than viewable rendition.
Manage Viewable Rendition
Controls ability to replace an existing viewable rendition by uploading a file or re-rendering the source file and ability to delete an existing viewable rendition.