Apple Details iWork.com Beta Improvements: Keynote Presentations and Publishing Optio

[MacRumors]

Last week, Apple released iWork 9.0.5, bringing a number of fixes and improvements to the company's productivity suite. Among the most substantial changes are enhancements to the iWork.com beta service that allows users to share projects online, including new support for playing back Keynote presentations and new options for publishing public and private documents.

Apple has just sent out an email to users registered for the iWork.com beta, highlighting the changes to the service and linking to updated feature pages on Apple's site discussing the capabilities.

Play back Keynote '09 presentations on the web, complete with animations.
Using Keynote for Mac, share your presentations and let viewers experience them with over 15 animations, video, hyperlinks, and audio. Play back a presentation on iWork.com using the latest version of Safari on a Mac or PC, iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch. Just swipe to advance slides on your iPad using Safari.

New publishing options for public sharing and private online storage.
Upload your documents for private online storage and easily access them from anywhere, or share your documents on social networks using a Public link. Also, you can now embed your presentation seamlessly on a website or blog using the embed code provided by iWork.com. To learn more about these features, and to view an embedded presentation, click here.

Apple announced the iWork.com beta alongside iWork '09 in January 2009. At the time, Apple stated that iWork.com would become a fee-based service once it exited beta mode and made a full public debut. But two years later, the service remains in beta form with only occasional feature updates. Apple has been widely expected to launch a new version of iWork in the relatively near future, with some suggesting it might make its debut alongside the Mac App Store last week, although those predictions failed to come true.

Article Link: Apple Details iWork.com Beta Improvements: Keynote Presentations and Publishing Options

 

[Richard1028]

It'll never fly

Make iWork MS-Office compatible. Until then this "paid" service will only find a home in limited educational environments.

Apple just doesn't get it.

 

[stewart715]

Make iWork MS-Office compatible. Until then this "paid" service will only find a home in limited educational environments.

Apple just doesn't get it.

I agree, unfortunately, MS Office will be the standard for a long time.

 

[roadbloc]

Make iWork MS-Office compatible. Until then this "paid" service will only find a home in limited educational environments.

Apple just doesn't get it.

iwork.com beta isn't a paid service. It comes free with iWork. And you have the option of uploading/downloading iWork 09, 08, MSOffice and PDF format files. It's a great feature that I use often for transferring my files between home and college.

 

[Consultant]

Make iWork MS-Office compatible. Until then this "paid" service will only find a home in limited educational environments.

Apple just doesn't get it.

Do you know iWork is Office compatible?

iWork can import and export office documents.

Some clueless people just don't get it.

 

[faganel]

I just dont understand ... why is iWork.com separate from MobileMe.
All cloud services has all in one.
Apple please check MS Live.com. Is an excelent service (and I'm an Apple fan ... so must be excelent).

Pleeeeeeeeeease do a complete service and dont stick with noumerous web addresess to complete a service others are offering for free.

And yes, Lice.com is working with excelence on iPhone (push)!

 

[BJB Productions]

I forgot iWork.com existed for a while...

I kinda have a feeling this is going to end up being a free service. If they want to compete with Google, they'd keep it free. I love Google docs because it's seamless with Gmail and is easy to access. Sure, it's got its downsides, but hey it's free.

 

[charlituna]

I just dont understand ... why is iWork.com separate from MobileMe.

indeed, you can use your mm as an apple id for the service so why not make it more integrated. Have, for example, your documents go to your iDisk. iWork.com could still be the site for others to see the files.

It could prove to be a good stepping stone to get folks to buy the full package (which could come down an easy $20 in price). They could make that part of a free feature set with limited storage, along with the whole now free 'find my' and perhaps the whole sync thing. Maybe also a limited space email (say 1gb). We pay for the rest.

 

[archipellago]

Do you know iWork is Office compatible?

iWork can import and export office documents.

Some clueless people just don't get it.

at Janet and John level maybe...

for real work use it isn't compatible.

Even basic Word formatting screws up with headers and footers etc.

 

[Richard1028]

Do you know iWork is Office compatible?

iWork can import and export office documents.

Some clueless people just don't get it.

Full MSOffice Macros? VBA Support?

LOL!

The real world does more with an office suite than make garage sale fliers and greeting cards son.

iwork.com beta isn't a paid service. It comes free with iWork.

Apple stated that iWork.com would become a fee-based service once it exited beta mode and made a full public debut.


Did you even read the article? Do you think it's called "beta" for a reason? Why would Apple burn server juice for free? (Hint --> MobileMe)

It's a great feature that I use often for transferring my files between home and college.

You're not even using it for its intended purpose. Which... I suspect nobody else is because no one in the mainstream community uses iWork.

Sorry if this pisses off the fanboys. As much as I like Apple products, iWork is useless in corporate america where file exchanges are the norm.

 

[d-klumpp]

iWork AND (newer) Office useless for scientists

I wish my presentations were as dumbed-down as Mr. Jobs'. Instead, I have the constant need to incorporate photos, videos, AND many graphs with error bars.

Unfortunately, the capability to directly paste a graph (e.g., Excel) and manipulate it as a drawing object disappeared from Office 2008, and Keynote never had this capability. Instead, both suites now force you to make edits by returning to the spreadsheet. This is perfectly stupid and inefficient for true power users that routinely need to modify graphs that may be years old.

Both PPT and KN are increasingly catering to a dumb crowd and leaving scientists without options. Once Office 2004 ceases to run on the latest-greatest OS/equipment, I'll be screwed by both MS and Apple.

Dave

 

[notjustjay]

Full MSOffice Macros? VBA Support?

LOL!

The real world does more with an office suite than make garage sale fliers and greeting cards son.

It's not even about that. Any kind of document that depends on precise formatting (say, a printed registration form with many fields, columns, boxes, lines) can get messed up. Margins and tabs get changed, fonts disappear and change, a one-page form spills over into two pages.

To me, "Office compatible" needs to pass this test: Create a document using Office. Open it using the "Office compatible" app. Make a small change, and save the file. Open it again using Office. Does it look exactly the same? Or have fonts, formatting, embedded objects, presentation animations, been changed or stripped away?

 

[HLdan]

Apple stated that iWork.com would become a fee-based service once it exited beta mode and made a full public debut.


Did you even read the article? Do you think it's called "beta" for a reason? Why would Apple burn server juice for free? (Hint --> MobileMe)

Before you attack someone else for not "reading the article" maybe you should think about this logically. What would stop Apple from charging the fee after all this time? They announced it might be fee based 2 years ago and it's still in beta. Did it occur to you that Apple is working on a business model for iWork.com and they could very well (dare I say it) change their minds and realize they can tie it all together with their iOS devices, Macs and maybe even Mobileme so an extra fee wouldn't be necessary?

 

[ziggyonice]

For normal, everyday people, iWork is wonderful. It's easy to use, extremely user friendly, and compatible with most everything it needs to be.

In a business setting however, Microsoft Office is the standard. There are some more advanced things that Office is able to do better than iWork, which is why Office is probably the better choice in that environment.

iWork.com is a good idea, but until it becomes a Google Docs competitor, I don't see it gaining much traction. I like the ability to be able to display Keynote presentations via a browser, but I'd also like the option to edit them from within the browser.

One thing at a time I guess.

 

[notjustjay]

Before you attack someone else for not "reading the article" maybe you should think about this logically. What would stop Apple from charging the fee after all this time? They announced it might be fee based 2 years ago and it's still in beta. Did it occur to you that Apple is working on a business model for iWork.com and they could very well (dare I say it) change their minds and realize they can tie it all together with their iOS devices, Macs and maybe even Mobileme so an extra fee wouldn't be necessary?

Don't forget, MobileMe was free once too.

 

[Westside guy]

Both PPT and KN are increasingly catering to a dumb crowd and leaving scientists without options.

I work at a university, and have sat through countless scientific talks involving Powerpoint presentations presented by faculty and grad students. Almost all of them must fall into your so-called "dumb crowd" because they aren't taking advantage of any significant part of Powerpoint's feature set.

I think you need to prove the correlation between "scientists" and "Powerpoint masters" rather than assuming it - I, for one, don't believe it exists.

 

[Snowy_River]

It's not even about that. Any kind of document that depends on precise formatting (say, a printed registration form with many fields, columns, boxes, lines) can get messed up. Margins and tabs get changed, fonts disappear and change, a one-page form spills over into two pages.

To me, "Office compatible" needs to pass this test: Create a document using Office. Open it using the "Office compatible" app. Make a small change, and save the file. Open it again using Office. Does it look exactly the same? Or have fonts, formatting, embedded objects, presentation animations, been changed or stripped away?

To be fair, there's more to compatiblity than just using the same app. I've seen Word documents that haven't come across from one computer to another because the two computers don't have the same fonts installed. So, complaining about fonts is a completely different issue.

I usually use iWork Pages for my word processing. Most of the time that I need to share a document, I use PDFs. On the rare occasion that I need to share with someone in an editable format, I will use Word.

Now, all of that said, I'm not trying to say that I'm the norm, simply trying to suggest that iWork isn't so completely incompatible with a work environment as some of the proclamations here would make it seem. It really only depends on what the people in charge of the standards for a given company decides to use.

 

[HLdan]

Don't forget, MobileMe was free once too.

Ha ha, true. Good old iTools. I will give you that one.

 

[notjustjay]

To be fair, there's more to compatiblity than just using the same app. I've seen Word documents that haven't come across from one computer to another because the two computers don't have the same fonts installed. So, complaining about fonts is a completely different issue.

I usually use iWork Pages for my word processing. Most of the time that I need to share a document, I use PDFs. On the rare occasion that I need to share with someone in an editable format, I will use Word.

Now, all of that said, I'm not trying to say that I'm the norm, simply trying to suggest that iWork isn't so completely incompatible with a work environment as some of the proclamations here would make it seem. It really only depends on what the people in charge of the standards for a given company decides to use.

I agree that there are lots of factors. I'm not necessarily laying the blame on any particular tool -- OpenOffice has similar issues. Even Microsoft takes some of the blame for frequently changing up the file format and making life difficult for everyone else (intentionally, no doubt).

Perhaps the test I described should be amended to consider "how long does it take to un-screw-up the document" rather than whether the document is 100% identical.

I'm simply speaking from experience. For several years I was in charge of setting up a paper registration form for a charity I volunteer with. It wasn't terribly complicated, but it did extend all the way out to the minimum margins and including a few object boxes containing text and graphics (e.g. charity logo, Visa/Mastercard logo). Each year we had to open the file, update a few dates, and reprint the form. One year it was done by someone else using OpenOffice. He emailed me back the "updated" Word files. I don't know what it looked like on his screen but on mine it was completely butchered. Formatting changed, margins changed, tabs in the wrong spot, lines too long/short and misaligned, text spilled over the margins and onto another page, objects in the wrong spot, causing text and bylines to be bumped. Worst of all, all of the graphics had been converted. Our logo had been rasterized and other bitmaps had been redithered funny. It was easier for me to go back to last year's Word files and redo the updates myself rather than try to fix the document he sent me.

That was probably the most extreme case I've personally seen, but it happens all the time.

 

[macsrcool1234]

Do you know iWork is Office compatible?

iWork can import and export office documents.

Some clueless people just don't get it.

Oh, the irony.

Clearly you have never actually tried working between the two. If you did, then you would know how poorly iWork imports the files.

 

[bobt]

If only numbers had some type of pivot table option I would probably not use Excel anymore. This is just a major feature in Excel that I find I can't live without. Rather see this then the focus on iwork.com.

 

[uncle.zed]

Is there any way to play it full screen? makeing presentation from browser window is little bit lame.

 

[Richard1028]

...maybe you should think about this logically...

...What would stop Apple from charging the fee after all this time?

Err... because nobody uses it? Because it's worthless and nobody will pay for it? (Ya think?)

And what do you mean "stop" charging? It's always been free yet still hasn't caught on. What does that tell you?

Did it occur to you that Apple is working on a business model for iWork.com and they could very well (dare I say it) change their minds and realize they can tie it all together with their iOS devices, Macs and maybe even Mobileme so an extra fee wouldn't be necessary?

Son, now you're just throwing handfuls of crap at a wall and hoping some will stick.

It's been free for 2 YEARS and nobody uses it. It's not "idea" that puts this notion on the trash heap.... it's the product it's built upon.

 

[bmburton13]

This would also be great if they incorporated iLife into it as well, i use iMovie and Garageband just as much as iWork and MSOffice

 

[Full of Win]

w/o editing, this is pretty pointless, at least for me. If I were to use this to 'share' something, the only response would be, why not just send me it as an attachment in an email.