I know that function as well, but as I've already written: That didn't help me back then. Unfortunately I don't have the file on my disk anymore...
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iWork '07 with Spreadsheet (Screenshot)
- Thread starter DavidLeblond
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I know that function as well, but as I've already written: That didn't help me back then. Unfortunately I don't have the file on my disk anymore...
Apple could use a more enterprise-level database app - maybe something based on SQL, but I HOPE APPLE NEVER MAKES ANYTHING LIKE MS ACCESS. Access is the most hell-ish app I have ever seen or had to work with.
That is unacceptable as a solution. It's a shame that this seems to be the only solution for an increasing number of things on the Mac. Rather than getting real OS X Cocoa apps we are having to run Windows now to get fully powered apps such as for personal finance, CAD, etc, and now for productivity (word processing, etc). What a shame
i disagree M$ force u to buy while apple doesn't, 3 licenses MS Office 2004 education verion cost $114. thats <$40 a copy, that isn't expensive, and iWork isn't free neither.
I agree apple's spreadsheet doesn't need to be as powerful as M$ excel, but again, in the arena, there is a free one, open office, with cross platform support.
But yeah, apple should try, at least for the future.
Although I use Pages for letter writing like AppleWorks there seems to be the problem that it won't save in a standard "word document" format. Pehaps this is just me being thick but what is the work around?
Pros - Apple finally has a complete package that replaces the aging POS that is Apple Works. It also is a cheaper package then Office.
Cons- Anyone in a business environment won't go near it because it isn't office.
Indifferent- XOver and Parallels makes the con a moot point for anyone who already owns office.
I already own office 2003 so this isn't that big of a deal, for me that is. I can see this as being great for your average user. However I would absolutely KILL to see this bundled into the purchase of a new Mac. Yes if MS did it people would be screaming bloody murder but Apple owns the platform from transistors to kernels, and as such its their right. Finally a truly complete package with one single purchase. Its a wonderful dream.
why does everyone think that everyone in the known universe still goes to school and as such qualifies for an educational discount?
Granted I'm considering going back but for now I and many others DON'T qualify.
Cons- Anyone in a business environment won't go near it because it isn't office.
Indifferent- XOver and Parallels makes the con a moot point for anyone who already owns office.
I already own office 2003 so this isn't that big of a deal, for me that is. I can see this as being great for your average user. However I would absolutely KILL to see this bundled into the purchase of a new Mac. Yes if MS did it people would be screaming bloody murder but Apple owns the platform from transistors to kernels, and as such its their right. Finally a truly complete package with one single purchase. Its a wonderful dream.
why does everyone think that everyone in the known universe still goes to school and as such qualifies for an educational discount?
Granted I'm considering going back but for now I and many others DON'T qualify.
Generally spoken that is true. But the situation is different with Apple. Microsoft even helped them out in the past. These two companies get on better together than it looks on at first. Microsoft loved having Apple as a compeditor. They needed a compeditor for anti-trust trials and they might need one again. And Apple is perfectly fitting this spot as a company which is not aggressively trying to get a bigger market share. And Bill Gates, for example, who still has a lot to say at MS, is a Mac fan. They are much more agressive against other compeditors. Just remember Steve Ballmer comparing open source software to cancer, when talking about Linux.
I think MS likes having Apple as the small compeditor, which regularily inspires them with new things that are later on copied into windows.
iWork is fine.
iWork is not meant to challenge MS Office. Just like iPhoto is not meant to challenge PhotoShop. Clearly iLife and iWork are consumer based applications that offer simplicity for the consumer. They're not trying to triumph in the professional market, so comparing them is silly.
If you want an Office alternative you could use NeoOffice (openoffice) or ThinkFree Office. Both are fairly feature rich and are competitors to MS Office. If you're a web junky and you just need to punch out a document or a simple spreadsheet you can use Google's Doc & Spreadsheets.
iWork is great for a consumer who wants an integrated suite with simplicity. It'll get the job done and it'll look semi professional. It's not a workhorse and it's not meant to be. I think it's good for what it is and it'll only get better.
iWork is not meant to challenge MS Office. Just like iPhoto is not meant to challenge PhotoShop. Clearly iLife and iWork are consumer based applications that offer simplicity for the consumer. They're not trying to triumph in the professional market, so comparing them is silly.
If you want an Office alternative you could use NeoOffice (openoffice) or ThinkFree Office. Both are fairly feature rich and are competitors to MS Office. If you're a web junky and you just need to punch out a document or a simple spreadsheet you can use Google's Doc & Spreadsheets.
iWork is great for a consumer who wants an integrated suite with simplicity. It'll get the job done and it'll look semi professional. It's not a workhorse and it's not meant to be. I think it's good for what it is and it'll only get better.
I think that once we saw that Keynote blew the pants off MS Powerpoint, we expected Apple to finish the job with a winner of an office suite. Then, Pages, we found out, was not so killer. It didn't suck, but it didn't best MS Word. People have mentioned, however, that it's better for making newletters and whatnot. Well here's my question:
Does Pages blow the pants off of MS Publisher? (Or is it Apple's intent to do so?) I mean, think about it. Publisher sucks as a word processor, but it *could* function as one... Maybe the current Pages is meant to evolve into a Publisher competitor and Apple will release a dedicated word processor, which will compete with MS Word. One never knows.
So for those of you saying "Charts" won't blow the pants off of Excel, don't be too sure. It very well might. It also, may very well be aimed at a consumer level, like many have already mentioned.
Regardless, we're talking about Apple, and Apple knows what they're doing. They know when their software is lack-luster, they know how to make it better, and you can be assured that they will do whatever they can to make iWork a viable option for as many people as possible.
-Clive
Does Pages blow the pants off of MS Publisher? (Or is it Apple's intent to do so?) I mean, think about it. Publisher sucks as a word processor, but it *could* function as one... Maybe the current Pages is meant to evolve into a Publisher competitor and Apple will release a dedicated word processor, which will compete with MS Word. One never knows.
So for those of you saying "Charts" won't blow the pants off of Excel, don't be too sure. It very well might. It also, may very well be aimed at a consumer level, like many have already mentioned.
Regardless, we're talking about Apple, and Apple knows what they're doing. They know when their software is lack-luster, they know how to make it better, and you can be assured that they will do whatever they can to make iWork a viable option for as many people as possible.
-Clive
File->Expot->Word appears to do the trick quite well enough...
I've been trying out Pages 6 for the last month (trial version about to expire) with a view to using it as a Word replacement. I need it for doing freelance writing where the required document format is Word. I've been using Word since Word for Windows 1.0a, and to be brutally honest that version would still be perfectly suitable for 99% of Word users today. I don't use any of the features that have bloated the application over teh years. None of my coleagues in my day job (in an IT copmpany no less) require any of the features. None of the people I have colaborated on writing projects in my freelance moonlighting role use any of those features. The only the requirment for a consistent file format has kept Word where it is (and not always - thanks to M$ fudging about with formats just to try and get people to upgrade).
My month with Pages has proven it to be a perfectly acceptible substitute - and far less expensive than upgrading to the next version of Word on the Mac is going to cost.
If a spreadsheet is added to iWork next week then I will be very tempted to buy it.
why does everyone think that everyone in the known universe still goes to school and as such qualifies for an educational discount?
Granted I'm considering going back but for now I and many others DON'T qualify.
didn't try before, can anybody tell me if u goto macmall and buy a student version, will they ask you for proof of student/teacher or not?
My experience is just the opposite.
I tried putting together a simple document with two graphics on each page with a table. The document was 55 two sided pages or 110 pages in total.
Trust me you don't want to even open this document with Pages. It takes literally 8 mins on a 1.67 GHz PPC PB with 2GB memory. This is with iWork 06. Everytime you scroll to make an edit or view another part of the document it forces a re-draw and there is about a 2 minute wait for the document to update.
Putting together the document was torture. It was a series of unlock / ungroup/ re-select/ alter position/ delete page break/ fix page spanning/ re-group/ re-lock. It drove me nuts!
I hate Pages. I haven't touched it since except for creating simple one page notes of information to myself. It is a worthless piece of CR%P. Not even close to a Word replacement and not a true desktop publishing app. It falls in the middle and fails.
I have given this document to other mac users who were Pages fanatics who thought that they could fix the document for me. That I had obviously done something wrong or were exagerating. Guess what everyone has failed miserably and now agree that this maybe the worst piece of software ever created by Apple.
The problem is that now Microsoft can pull the same crap they did with IE. Point and tell everyone that Apple has their own solution and anyone who wants to can run Office through XOver or Parallels. (Even though Office 2003 in XOver is still a joke.) There simply is no reason for MS to continue to develop for the Mac platform. There are many alternate solutions now. I fully expect MS to release a UB of Office and then kill MS office for the Mac.
But if you don;t qualify for the educational version (and you need to install it on a laptop and a desktop), then it is in fact very,very expensive.
Well, I'm neither hunt-and-peck nor 50 wpm unless I'm really on a roll, so I'm not ordinarily affected by this problem (which is lag, not lock-up). When I'm just hammering out text I don't use any word processor anyway -- I use TextEdit. But I agree, Pages needs to be made faster to keep up with efficient typists.
well, i understand. then i guess the question becomes, how good will iWork spreadsheet be when compare to openoffice?
they don't need to buy, openoffice is opensource, apple can do this just like they did with safari and KHTML, buy apple will need to make iWork free in some form, which I doubt they want to.
why does everyone think that everyone in the known universe still goes to school and as such qualifies for an educational discount?
Granted I'm considering going back but for now I and many others DON'T qualify.
If you aren't in school than iWork is an even better deal. It isn't that much more than the Ed-discount, but Office is much more without the student discount.
I've not had any problems with lag... But with a 3GHz Quad Mac Pro behind it "lag" is not somehting I've had a problem with. Perhaps I should dig out my old G4 Mac Mini an see what it is like there????
Thanks, that does it for me.
Enough with the lumbering Microsoft POS that takes for ever to start itself up and in its absurd over complication reminds me of Gates' sick self.
I know several people that have been waiting for an iWork spreadsheet program; my dad, for example, is sick of having to run OpenOffice in addition to Pages and Keynote (and he wouldn't touch MS Office with a ten foot stick). Hopefully this pans out.
Most people don't get this deal. They have to pay $400 for one copy of Office. However, anybody can get an iWork family pack for $100. That's $20 a seat.
Apple gives us a bargain, and still people complain.
Obligatory eye-rolling to follow:
I never heard that Microsoft was going to quit making an OS X verions of Office. I have a hunch they are going to wait to upgrade it so the Vista version looks more and functions more like the mac version. The UI is so clunky in windows. They aren't going to fire a bunch of guys in programming when they are clearly making money selling to the Apple users. When you think about all the things microsoft creates and loses money on, they aren't going to stop making money because they want to stick it to Steve Jobs.
I don't see them making any significant changes to MS WORD anyway. How much better can you make a memo look?
Honestly, I just like the built in "SAVE AS PDF" function on my apps so I can send things out in that format. I don't like the blue and red formatting lines that show up when I send word documents anyway.
I don't see them making any significant changes to MS WORD anyway. How much better can you make a memo look?
Honestly, I just like the built in "SAVE AS PDF" function on my apps so I can send things out in that format. I don't like the blue and red formatting lines that show up when I send word documents anyway.
Most people don't get this deal. They have to pay $400 for one copy of Office. However, anybody can get an iWork family pack for $100. That's $20 a seat.
Apple gives us a bargain, and still people complain.
Obligatory eye-rolling to follow:
An interesting excercie is to look at how every single component and program you run on it has come down in price by orders of magnitude over the last 10 years.
With one exception.
Any OS or application with the word "MicroSoft" on it...
Makes you think.