Perhaps it's not that Apple is beefing up the iWork team, but rather that they've let some people go recently...
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Continues Building iWork Team, Adds New Job Listings
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I've been very happy with iWork '09 and iWork for iOS sans with Numbers. Pages and Keynote have been a welcome improvement over Word and Powerpoint for my purposes, as well as many of my coworkers who have been switching over the last couple years. The only reason I keep Office around is for Excel, which is still superior to Numbers in my opinion. Even the OpenOffice Spreadsheet program tends to work better for me than Numbers. I'm not sure what it is, but something about it just feels very clunky to me. To be fair though, I haven't put much time into really learning it, but every time I've tried to use it, I've wanted to switch back to Excel almost immediately. And again, I had the exact opposite reaction with Pages and Keynote, which made me never want to touch Word or Powerpoint again.
The last three versions of MS Office had release cycles of 2, 4, and 3 years. If iWork gets an update this year, it had release cycles of 4, 2, and 1 years. So, fairly similar.
Exactly! I never understood why they discontinued the iWork.com beta without keeping any of its features in iCloud.com. It was only commenting and downloading in different formats, but it was working OK.
I hope (and somehow "feel") that iOS 7 and OS 10.9 and the next update to iCloud will be a lot about sharing. Like: File sharing, commenting and editing, allow sandboxed app(lication)s to grant each other access, etc. They worked a lot on getting iCloud up and running (as far as the base functionality is concerned), they improved the iOS versions of iWork a lot, now is the time to make ends meet. (Trying to convince myself here... but hopeful!)
And Office updates are oftentimes very, very unwelcome. As said above, I only use Excel at this point, but I've gone so far as to continue using the 2003 Excel at work on Windows when I want to be as efficient as possible. I'm running 2011 Office on my iMac at home, though I only use it when I need to work from home in a pinch, and again, only for Excel. If Apple can improve Numbers, I'll be all but done with Office altogether, and it will be a happy day.
I think and hope this is coming soon, but I'm not expecting it this year. I think this year will be more about the Jony Ive dust-up while next year will be heavy on the iCloud improvements, as more of their server farms get up and running.
or you could give up your sense of entitlement.
me, I like a solid piece of reliable software better than the never ending stream of releases from Microsoft.
"a HiDP Image Specialist"
should be
"a HiDPI Image Specialist"
I'm also not sure how one can claim to be a HiDPI specialist. Icons are higher-resolution and that's it.
The fact that the screen is small for its resolution (i.e. has a high pixel density) changes nothing, unless by "specialist" they mean having a good eyesight.
should be
"a HiDPI Image Specialist"
I'm also not sure how one can claim to be a HiDPI specialist. Icons are higher-resolution and that's it.
The fact that the screen is small for its resolution (i.e. has a high pixel density) changes nothing, unless by "specialist" they mean having a good eyesight.
They've been busy developing the iOS side of iWork (and any OS X updates are for iOS features), just as the iOS versions of iLife '11 (aside from iTunes of course). Apple has been hard at work with iOS development, even in OS X. As for the Mac [cue taps].
I really miss iWeb and iDVD updates. For the life of me I don't know why Apple removed web hosting as part of MobileMe before the iCloud transition. I would have paid had Apple kept up keychain and improved iDisk and web hosting. Free accounts are a good way to market their hardware, that is when they're functioning.
does apple still operate out of a garage?
i welcome updates and possible progress to these apps but as far as i am concerned they have lost all relevance and i primarily use google docs and then libreoffice.
apples treatment of these apps and its users is embarrassing and ridiculous and perfect example of how stagnant the company has become last few years.
Actually, that'd means it's a low pixel density image running on a high pixel density display.
I LOOOOVEEEE BEING PEDANTIC!
Apple lists this as an HiDP Image Specialist, though in the description it does say HiDPI, so maybe a typo on their part. See here:
https://jobs.apple.com/us/search?#&ss=iwork&t=0&so=&lo=0*USA&pN=0&openJobId=25348969
Edited to add that I updated it, and thanks
Last edited:
oh lawd...jobs was here for plenty of years of no major releases for iWork or pros. they had other priorities.
acquisitions for for the sake of it are more disruptive to an org than good. apple invests more wisely than that.
iOS is constantly gaining new functionality and changes, even if they aren't bling. thank heavens.
iPhone as a category is maturing rapidly -- you won't see major changes but instead iterative improvement. just like notebooks and desktops before that.
cooks is CEO of the most profitable PC maker AND mobile maker...lions share of wealth in both sectors. and you think it's time to fire him. get...real.
While this is true, the iWork apps might not be hurt by a few tweaks in the UI on the desktop side. Like perhaps changing out the pop ups for the sliding panel form seen in iPhoto and Aperture.
And both versions as well as iPhoto and iMovie could perhaps use plug in support so that folks can 'pro' up any of the software with the more advanced bits like MathType or filters, etc. Such a scheme has served the pro apps pretty well over the years.
I also wouldn't mind seeing more fonts supported on the iOS level across all apps, say the most popular 10. With the ability of one wishes to download more, even if the choices are controlled by Apple. I'm sure noteworthy is a lovely font but I would rather my notes be in Arial and if fonts were at an iOS level I could. And it would reduce bloat from the fonts being in app and those downloaded several times.
And in regards to the iOS iLife apps I wouldn't fuss if they actually took the iMovie for iOS themes and trailers out of the base download and not only made them DLC (for free) content but added a few more so that they are on par with the desktop. And allowed the same transferring and importing of trailers as they do projects. GarageBand loops could be handled in a similar way with more of the 'jam packs' available to those that want them. And iPhoto could take on a controller mode where the device brushes could be used to edit photos on the desktop. With perhaps more filters and brushes.
iWeb was a mess. Dirtiest code I've ever seen. Especially the HTML widgets and was a cluster it was to tweak the code. While it was great to have something in theory it needed a lot of work. They needed to buy something like MacFlux or RapidWeaver and then perhaps update their servers to also allow sites similar to blogger and Wordpress.
But even now they could actually still pull off something that would be fine for many folks. Just take all the iPhoto journals, shared photo stream etc stuff and allow for the creation of a single home page. Perhaps even allow for a shared documents tag in iCloud for a partial restoration if iWork.com and stuff like showing your iTunes reviews. If they ever bring back the stuff from Lala.com that could be there also. Maybe some kind of widgets to add buttons to your Facebook etc and that would be enough of a home page for many.
Really??
Okay, never mind the fact that Steve Jobs died not even two years ago and claimed Apple had a 5 year product pipeline around that time. Tim Cook has done a fine job. When problems arise he has dealt with it (Scot Forstall).
I'm sure theres also a number of companies with people like you who Apple has been trying to deal with that have slowed some deals down for Apple (iRadio, Apple TV) but I have a feeling we will be seeing some of these things soon enough.
The non-existent Mac Pro update has been ridiculous, though we are close enough to WWDC and I wouldn't doubt we see it then. Considering that Mac's aren't their primary source of revenue now, and the Mac Pro is probably not even the primary source of income from Macs, this is almost understandable... almost.
The slow software updates are sad too, and I never understood while Apple doesn't just hire more developers. They have had to move developer's around or delay one thing for another too often and that should have been an obvious solution. Their excuses I have heard for them not doing that were all from the time before Steve Jobs died, and are all crap. If you hire the right people with the right leaders, you can have more programmers without the problems they claimed more programmers would lead to. But... with this very article it shows they are actually trying to hire more people.
I'd say give Tim Cook a little more credit and a few more years before calling for his job.
You have a limited understanding of Apple history and Steve Jobs. As an example, Apple was late to CD-R even though early to CD's, and I've yet to be able to buy Apple hardware for BD, which surprisingly, doesn't seem to have much utility any more for the consumer. Early to USB, but late to USB 3.0, so that Apple could use Intel's Ivy Bridge architecture and avoid a separate chipset. Early to TB but dropping Ethernet for an optional dongle. Maybe this will be the year that the Mac Pro comes back with a total redefinition of a workstation vengeance with a 4k surprise.
After the fact, it always seems that Apple was skating to where the puck is going to be. Probably as true with software, and plenty of examples of long stretches between major upgrades; I'm looking at you iTunes, iWork and you FCX.
Apple doesn't spend a lot of resources adding minor feature updates. That was as true under Jobs as it is true under Cook.
I've been using Mac's since the 128, so forgive me if I note your impatience relative to mine. Experience has taught me that Apple will give us what we need, more so that what we want, and it will be on Apple's schedule, assuming that it isn't killed off entirely. So far, the bulk of Apple's current customer base seem to be okay with that, grumbling aside. If anything, I find Tim Cook to be more revealing in the future than Steve ever was.
As for how the competition works, let's just say that the numbers back up Apple's thrifty spending, whether acquisition or R&D, over some of the competition's recent acquisitions.
Only in the sense of a total rewrite. It has been updated several times over the years. And many are happy that cause a full rewrite would likely mean paying again. Better to drop the dates from both packs and just keep 'updating' for free.
Well, I agree with your point that there were many times that Apple did NOT update its OS under Jobs when it probably should have. And I agree with you that in many ways iOS has not needed an update just for the sake of an update ... HOWEVER ... I do believe you are completely wrong about acquisitions. If you read MacRumors frequently, you would know that another company is now acquiring a map company that Apple relies on for its maps app. That's just ONE example. It would be chunk change for Apple to pick up the best in the industry and yet they have been completely passive. If you think that Cook is doing a good job ... you are incorrect. Cook is managing decline.
Yeah I just feel like they think they've done all they can do. Doesn't seem like they arent capable of really innovating anymore, which is weird.