Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

iWork '08... what will I miss?

J

Jagurandi

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 9, 2008
15
0
Yo,
I'm a college student (and next fall, a graduate student) and soon (today) to be ordering a new MB. I've gotten wind of the fact that someone is getting me iWork '08 for Christmas to go with my new computer.
I've never used any iWork applications before. Throughout college I've used neo/open-office for most everything I needed doing, and borrowed the gf's computer when I need excel, power point, etc.
I've read plenty of reviews of iWork and comparisons with office, etc. What I'm wondering is this: if I wanted to start using iWork for papers, presentations, etc... would I, in practice, be likely to miss anything? Do you feel like iWork 'gets the job done'? I'm just looking for impressions to get an idea of what to expect.

Thanks
 
You can use Mroogle to search for threads related to "iWork vs. Office" because there are hundreds, at least.

If you're used to OpenOffice/NeoOffice, I see no reason why you'd miss anything by switching to iWork.

Also, as a side note, you may not want to open the copy of iWork '08 until after the keynote in early january (the 6th, I believe) in the event that iWork 09 is released.
 
You will have a thirty day preview version Work preinstalled on your new Mac. If someone gives you iWork as a gift, all you'll need to do is enter the serial number from the registration card.
 
Don't let anyone tell you that you can write and read MS Office docs without trouble. You can't. You can just about load most formats, but there will be problems, some formatting wont work, some things will be broken.

iWork + Open Office probably, just about, covers the MS Office hole. I still use MS Office apps on my mac quite regularly however.

Doug
 
As for just writing papers, honestly I think Pages or Word are overkill. Unless you need anything fancy, TextEdit gets the job done without bloat.
 
well, and how do you want to quote publications using Endnote? MS Word is the only choice, unfortunately. Forget pages or textedit.

Keynote though is much superior to PP. If you need to play your presentation from a windows PC, just export as pdf and let it run on the PC with Acrobat Reader in Full Screen mode.

Best,
Phil

devburke said:
As for just writing papers, honestly I think Pages or Word are overkill. Unless you need anything fancy, TextEdit gets the job done without bloat.
Click to expand...
 
pstock said:
well, and how do you want to quote publications using Endnote? MS Word is the only choice, unfortunately. Forget pages or textedit.

Keynote though is much superior to PP. If you need to play your presentation from a windows PC, just export as pdf and let it run on the PC with Acrobat Reader in Full Screen mode.

Best,
Phil
Click to expand...

Like I said, for the most basic functions of papers, TextEdit is fine. I haven't had to quote publication with Endnote, so I don't know what that's all about, but I'd classify that as something above basic essay writing. I've written all my papers in college using TextEdit (except for a couple I wrote in NeoOffice when I was trying that out for awhile, but that was waaay bloated and messy for my purposes).

One thing I will say about Keynote is that it tends to run into formatting issues when importing PP files.

Also, you can export from Keynote to PP. I haven't done it myself, is there some reason you recommend using PDF for compatibility with Windows rather than PP?
 
I bought Office for my first Mac. After six months I deleted the app in bought iWork. I hated bringing the Windowness into my new Mac world. Constant updates, error messages and confusion between Entourage syncing with other apps. I don't miss Office at all. I saved all my Office templates and imported them into pages and made them pages templates. I have no trouble reading word docs or anything else for that matter, and none of my contacts ever complain that their PC can't read what I send them. I just export everything to the Office formats. Enjoy iWork!
 
IJ Reilly said:
By fancy, you mean like page numbers, headers or footers?
Click to expand...

Maybe fancy was an overstatement :D

But you know what I mean, something beyond the most basic needs for writing a paper. I've never needed to do anything for my papers that TextEdit can't do (although everyone has different needs)
 
devburke said:
Maybe fancy was an overstatement :D

But you know what I mean, something beyond the most basic needs for writing a paper. I've never needed to do anything for my papers that TextEdit can't do (although everyone has different needs)
Click to expand...

I know what you're saying, I did my undergrad with ClarisWorks. Office is over the top for most users; iWork is probably the best middle ground.
 
devburke said:
Maybe fancy was an overstatement :D

But you know what I mean, something beyond the most basic needs for writing a paper. I've never needed to do anything for my papers that TextEdit can't do (although everyone has different needs)
Click to expand...

Page numbers are pretty basic, I think, even for a short paper or report. I use TextEdit for a whole lot of things, but not for anything that will be leaving my office.
 
What I have on my computer

-Word
-Keynote
-Excel

For presentations I either can save as a quicktime file and my animations will save or save as a PP if you don't have fancy animation
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back