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Pages and Numbers Not Syncing in iCloud

Bookmarks, Contacts and Calendars are all syncing with icloud. Works beautifully, however when I change a Pages or Numbers document on my MacBook Pro, it doesn't sync with my ipad. itunes 10.5, ios 5, Lion 7.2 in use. Am I doing something wrong? Thanks, Rob

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.1), 2.2 Ghz Intel Core i7, 8 GB Ram

Posted on Oct 12, 2011 5:51 PM

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Posted on Oct 13, 2011 9:16 AM

I too realized this was happening for me, and read the iCloud features page more closely. Apparently, it doesn't actually do what we want it to (and what I thought it was presented as doing). It only automatically syncs documents across iOS devices, but not Macs. Lame.

This is the quote from the iCloud documents page :

"

Documents in the Cloud. And on your Mac or PC.

iCloud makes it easy to move Pages, Keynote, and Numbers documents between your computer and your iOS devices. Just sign in to icloud.com/iwork in any modern web browser, and all your iWork for iOS documents will be there — complete with your most recent edits. Click a document to download it in iWork ’09, Microsoft Office, or PDF format. You can also drag and drop any iWork ’09 or Microsoft Office document from your computer into one of the iWork apps on icloud.com, and it automatically appears on all your iOS devices, ready for you to review, edit, or present.

"


So to sync with the Mac, you have to manually drag and drop into the iCloud interface.


I really hope Apple updates this so that it automatically syncs with Macs also, because otherwise it's usefulness is severely limited.

230 replies
Question marked as Best reply

Oct 13, 2011 9:16 AM in response to Rob Weinberg

I too realized this was happening for me, and read the iCloud features page more closely. Apparently, it doesn't actually do what we want it to (and what I thought it was presented as doing). It only automatically syncs documents across iOS devices, but not Macs. Lame.

This is the quote from the iCloud documents page :

"

Documents in the Cloud. And on your Mac or PC.

iCloud makes it easy to move Pages, Keynote, and Numbers documents between your computer and your iOS devices. Just sign in to icloud.com/iwork in any modern web browser, and all your iWork for iOS documents will be there — complete with your most recent edits. Click a document to download it in iWork ’09, Microsoft Office, or PDF format. You can also drag and drop any iWork ’09 or Microsoft Office document from your computer into one of the iWork apps on icloud.com, and it automatically appears on all your iOS devices, ready for you to review, edit, or present.

"


So to sync with the Mac, you have to manually drag and drop into the iCloud interface.


I really hope Apple updates this so that it automatically syncs with Macs also, because otherwise it's usefulness is severely limited.

Oct 13, 2011 9:57 AM in response to dsuden

You were heading in the correct direction. The iCloud web interface i.e. www.icloud.com; then the iWork area - will allow you to drag and drop a file to send to cloud. In the open appication, eg numbers, you left click and drag the file name at the top of the open window - see red area below, to the open iCloud web page and the copied file will gain a green plus sign as you drag it into the area it recognizes - then let go of the left click and the file transfer dialogue will open.User uploaded file


It is messy, and like others I think it is a backwards way of doing things. It is early days, so there will be changes down the road to these applications as feedback is expressed.

Oct 13, 2011 10:52 AM in response to Rob Weinberg

It seems there are issues with non-Apple application files which originate from a Mac (and maybe other platforms). The documents I have on my iPad in Keynote appear in iCloud/iWork/Keynote and I can download or duplicate or delete. Some originated in PowerPoint, I put them on my iPad and in turn by default I shared them once I activated iCloud last night. That's the good news.


The bad news, so far, is while I 'can' upload PowerPoint presentations by dragging them from my MBP/Finder to iCloud/iWork/Keynote, once there I can only duplicate or delete them. I cannot download them. Thus they're seemingly of no use. I suspect this is a bug (or a configuration/user error though I couldn't find one).


Color me perplexed...

Oct 14, 2011 3:28 AM in response to Rob Weinberg

What is worse about reading this is that I spent nearly an hour on the phone to Applecare yesterday trying to work out why the documents weren't updating on my Mac and the experts didn't have a clue. Eventually they sent me a screen grab to see if there was something wrong with my computer. Very poor but it shows that even apples staff would expect iCloud to work in this way otherwise to use their words "whats the point in it". Thanks for clarifying the situation and lets hope there is a fix in the near future. Once they have it sorted it will be a great system.

Oct 16, 2011 7:45 AM in response to tooluser

This whole issue is a big disappointment to me but what seems even more crazy is that if you create a Pages Document on your Mac and upload it to the iCloud Web interface as suggested you can then access the document via the web interface on say an iPad or iPhone. Once you do this there are options for opening the document in iBooks and in various other Apps - but not in the iPhone or iPad version of Pages! I have found that the best method to get round this is to email the Pages document to myself and then to open the email attachment on the iPad from where you do get the option to open the Document in the Pages App on the iPad!!!

Oct 16, 2011 9:18 AM in response to jackfromwellington

I don't have a problem with manually uploading a file to iCloud. But shouldn't that file then automatically appear in Pages on my iPhone? Or if I create a new file in Pages on my phone, shouldn't it automatically appear in iCloud? And why do I get a welcome document in Pages on my phone, but that same welcome document doesn't appear in iCloud.


In addition, I've seen screen shots posted by people who have successfully used iWork and iCloud documents, and those documents in iCloud show preview icons. In my case, anything I manually upload to Pages only shows a file with the Pages icon, not an actual preview.


If you saw iWork and iCloud being demoed in the manner you were expecting, but it's not working for you in the same manner (as in my case), then something needs to get fixed on Apple's end.

Oct 17, 2011 8:38 PM in response to billfromlondonderry

Another way to get a Numbers, for example, document from iMac to iCloud and then to iPad, is to click on the gear icon in upper right corner and click upload. It will take you to Finder whre you can click on one or more documents.


My question is, where I have already uploaded a Numbers document from my iMac, and then I make changes on my iMac, when I upload the document again it asks to replace the previous document of the same name I previously uploaded. I, of course, tell it to replace since I have made changes.


However, when I make changes on the iPad and want to save the changes to the iMac, I figured I would use download. It does load the changed Numbers document on the iMac, but as a new document from the one being changed. In other words, I now have two documents by the same name, in diffierent places, in different stages of change. Is there any way to move the document from iPad to iMac, even if manually, and have it replace the same document on the iMac that has been changed by the changes made on the iPad?

Pages and Numbers Not Syncing in iCloud

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