Comparing documents side by side

ark-1 wrote:
I made the mistake of inserting corrections into one document and then continuing with a second document later on (I wasn't careful about the name the name I assigned to the edited version). Now I want to go over them both and make the corrections. How does one bring up two documents and compare them?

Open one document, then Open the other. Make each of them narrower, if necessary, by dragging the lower right corner handle. Place them side-by-side and compare. I don't believe that there is any automated way to do this.

Jerry

ark-1 wrote:
Thanks Jerry - but I'm shocked! No way to compare two documents???? That's such a basic in Word. Oh well.

Had you been Tracking Changes this would be a non-issue, wouldn't it? I suppose it would be somewhat awkward, but you could use Services > Statistics on suspect sections to see if there are any differences in character count, number of spaces, words, lines, etc.

Jerry

Pages is a much slimmer package than Word. Just look at the interface. I can't speak for others but my preference would be for Apple to resist the temptation to overstuff Pages with options and concentrate on making what it does have work smoothly and consistently.

Good luck,

Jerry

ark-1 wrote:
I agree Jerry - but wouldn't having a convenient way to access a dictionary or thesaurus, or an option to compare documents be sort of an industry standard?

You can right-click a word, in any application, without even selecting it, and get a quick dictionary definition, with an option for "more" leading to a full definition with links to a thesaurus, Wikipedia. etc. It's an OS X feature, not Pages only, and very handy.

I don't know what standards there may be for word processing apps. I'd be surprised to find one.

It is so much more difficult to relearn and learn the first time. I have learned to not expect applications behave in the same way as I have learned in another application. I alway try to find another way to get the new application work for me. If you want Word behavior use Word, but a lot can be done in Pages but it is done in another way.

No we users can't do that. A bug is something wrong in the application the programmers need to change. Until it is corrected in a newer version of Pages or maybe it is Snow Leopards doing, we have to keep the dictionary window open as I described before. So keep it open and don't close it, just hide it.

Hi Jerrold

Here, running Mac Os X 10.4.11,
when I right click a word, I don't get a quick definition.

I typed a classical verse from Jean Racine :
+Pour qui sont ces serpents qui sifflent sur vos têtes ?+
I control-clicked 'serpents' and got :



To get a definition, I must enter the item "Outils d'écriture" (Writing Tools in English). In fact, it would be useless because the only dictionary available is the Oxford English one which can't help me for French words 😟

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) mercredi 17 février 2010 18:03:01

Yvan,

We can make a keyboard shortcut for Pages "Look Up in Dictionary and Thesaurus". I used Command-Shift-D. Then it is single-click in a way.

Of course I find no entry for French words here either.

Jerry

I know that we may define a shortcut but I just wanted to check the behaviour of the ctrl-click .

When I want the definition of a French word, I use one of the online French dictionaries.

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) mercredi 17 février 2010 18:27:35

KOENIG Yvan wrote:
I know that we may define a shortcut but I just wanted to check the behaviour of the ctrl-click .

Yes, the behavior is different with Pages than with other applications. Needlessly different in my opinion.

Jerry