Creating a booklet in Pages

The easy way to create a booklet is to use page size in Pages as the booklet will have. That is if you want the pages to be A5 use A5 and not A4 with 2 "pages".

Create the booklet and give it page numbers. Also check in the Inspector palette > Document tab > Facing pages. Make the inner margin a little wider. When ready first save a Pages document so you'll have a version that can be made changes to. Then go File > Print > PDF button > Create booklet (if you have installed it that is). You will get a special PDF file which you open and go print to print in the normal way. Create booklet will have placed the pages in the right order for a booklet. It is really easy when you have tried it.

Solution 1 (a or b) is not easy. I had several templates in AppleWorks for various numbers of pages. Pages makes fitting the content to a specific number of pages much easier as I can "play" with line & character spacing.

I recently had to use this method for my Sunday church bulletin when my Mac running Leopard wouldn't work & I didn't have another Mac with Leopard handy. It made me install Leopard on a Mac before next week's bulletin was due. I think I should reorganize the reply & put the easy solution first.

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I'm not sure how "easy" it is for others, but for me it is. These are instructions I wrote quite some time ago & I've updated them periodically.

There are a few ways to do this. The first two involve setting your Pages document in File > Page Setup… to landscape orientation. I originally wrote this for Pages 2. In Pages 3 or 4, use the page layout mode for #s 1a & 1b.

1a - Use linked text boxes. This is easier done with the layout showing. First you need to add a page break to have two pages. Click in the body area & then Insert > Page Break. Now click outside the layout area to enter object mode & click the "T" in the tool bar or Insert > Text to create a text box & type something in it. This is to keep the box from disappearing if you click elsewhere & the text can be replaced later. If you already have some text to paste in you can just paste while in object mode & a text box containing your text will be created. You will now need to click outside the layout again & drag the cursor toward the text box to select it. You can now position the first text box in the lower right of your 2-page document. It is easier to see where it goes if you have the document set up with 2 columns. Click on the blue-outlined tab at the lower right of the text box to create a new of the same size & move the box to the upper left. Repeat for a box for the upper right & again for the lower right. You will now have 4 linked text boxes.

1b - Start as in 1a creating a 2-page document with 2 columns in landscape orientation. For this one you will use the body text area. Just type or paste your text in as normal, starting in the upper left. When you have your text done, cut all of the text in the first column (upper left), insert a column break after the last character on the now lower left column & paste the cut text after it in the now lower right column.

Neither one of these will let you automatically use page numbers because Pages "sees" each page & you actually have 2 pages per page.

2 - For users of Leopard or earlier, use Cocoa Booklet. For a folded letter-size booklet start with your Pages document in Legal size & larger than normal font size. For an A5 booklet, create your Pages document in A4 size & larger font size. Export the Pages document to a PDF & then drag the PDF to the icon of Cocoa Booklet. It will create a new PDF in booklet form.

CocoaBooklet no longer works in Snow Leopard so you'll need to use Create Booklet Service to create a booklet with any number of pages (best in a multiple of 4). I like the results better with CocoaBooklet, so I save my Pages document as a PDF on my iMac running Snow Leopard & then transfer the file via my network to my Mac mini running Leopard to make the booklet with CocoaBooklet & then copy it back to my iMac. I actually do all of this from my iMac. My Mac mini runs "headless" as a print & weather server, so I use Back-to-My-Mac screen sharing.

You have definitely not tried everything.

See *Imposing booklets:*

http://www.freeforum101.com/iworktipsntrick/viewtopic.php?t=181&highlight=imposi tion&mforum=iworktipsntrick

Peter

You are going the hard way about this.

Just stick to creating the pdfs and you can shuffle them in the .pdf by dragging them in the thumbnail

If you want more than one page per sheet you can drag out individual pages from the pdf and drag those pdfs into a new Pages document in the order you want to print them.

Have you looked at the instructions in the link I posted?

If you really want to remove sections:

+Menu > View > Show Invisibles > Delete the blue lines with chapter icons+

However this will probably lead to further complications.

Peter

You believe wrong. Please reread the instructions.

Just rearrange the .pdf files from the output, without having to go from scratch.

A pdf page is a rectangular graphic. You can put it where you want it.

The 3rd party imposition utilities will do the job for you, but you can do it manually if you want.

Peter

I got the PDF, converted it to an A5 booklet PDF & sent it back. All I had to do was change the preferences in CocoaBooklet since I normally use US Letter size. I do recall it not being easy to get the settings so that I got the output I wanted, though. Now it's very quick & easy for me since I do it so often.

Hi Calocasia
I produce many booklets here in UK (A4 folded to A5) The best program for me is Cheap Impostor - handles all my imposition a treat! Produce your booklet as you like it - export as pdf - launch Cheap Impostor and open the pdf from there - Sorted! One of these days Apple will realise that Pages without imposition facility is a BIG oversight.