how do I do a "save as" on Pages?

Folder icons are hidden.

Datas describing the layout of icons in a folder are hidden.

Datas stored by Spotlight are hidden

Trashes are hidden

A lot of executable Unix command files are hidden because they are not designed to be triggered thru the GUI interface.

They are hundreds of files hidden for this reason.

As far as I know, most of us never saw gears in their motorcar gearbox and they never saw what is in the motor itself. Most of human beings are ignoring what or where is this or that organ of their body.

When everything is transparent, it's no longer democracy, it's fascism.

I repeat that you are boring.

AutoSave is a feature, Versions is an other one. It's really pitiful that beings supposed to be intelligent like you and some others in these discussions forums prove to be unable to understand what was explained here more than 20 times.

So, I repeat.

Autosave is supposed to apply automatically when we change something in a document.

Versions apply :

(1) just before or just after (I don't know this detail) when we save a document for the 1st time.

It's needed to build the structure in which versions related datas wil be stored when required.

(2) when we trigger a deeply hidden menu item named « Save A Version ».

I'm really puzzled by the numbers users perfectly ignorant which wrote that this item replace Save As.

Being ignorant isn't a crime but writing this or that about what we ignore is near that.

(3) after one hour elapsed since the last « store versions datas » action.

As you see, I don't use the Apple wording to underline the fact that « Save a Document » and « Store a version » is not the same thing.

When we apply the default iWork '09 format, a document is tha result of an elaborate compact task applied to a folder.

The datas stored in versions are completely different.

Say, I create a Pages document from the Blank template.

I save it immediately because I'm aware of the bug striking in Lion.

Doing that, the app create the well known document.

Versions create it's own structure (a SQL database one):

it store :

the buildVersionHistory.plist file

the index.xml file

the Thumbnail.jpg file which is normally in QuickLook subfolder.

I never checked but I assume that it stores also the PkgInfo file which is normally in Contents subfolder

Now, I make some changes in the embedded text, paste a picture and decide to « Store A Version » (I repeat that I deliberately use my own wording).

The changes which I made introduced no modification in PkgInfo so this one is not stored an other time in the Versions datas.

index.xml was changed, thumnail.jpg was changed because it reflects the document's first page. So these modified items are stored but the old ones aren't removed. I forgot to name buildVersionHistory.plist file which is modified so stored in versions.

The picture file describing the pasted image is stored too.

Back to the document, I decide to add some text, I replace the picture by an other one and one more time, I trigger « Store a Version ».

the new index.xml, the new thumbnail.jpg, the new buildVersionHistory.plist file and the new picture file will be stored (I repeat that the old ones aren’t removed).

When I open the buildVersionHistory.plist file with Property List Editor, I see a date but no time value.

I guess that it's just a feature of the editor because the time info is available but maybe, it's just grabbed from the file's creation date.

The process will continue during the document's life.

Happily, not too dumb users will not trigger « Store A Version » so often.

From my point of view, the one hour delay defined by Apple is too long so, I trigger it every 10 minutes but it's just my own advice.

I guess that you are thinking : « what a mess, it use a lot of disk space ».

You are quite right but:

the system has its own workflow to rule the HD use. I will not detail this workflow because it wouuld be too long.

Just say that from time to time, the system apply some cleaning. One more reason to use my scripts to keep a complete history of the documents.

If I continue to work during 58 minutes on the doc without storing a version by hand then close it, only the document will be saved.

If I continued to work 60 minutes in lieu of 58, Versions will apply automatically and store the document's components which were modified during the 60.

I described what apply to iWork documents.

As I already wrote elsewhere, iWork apps were not coded with brains but with feet.

If they were coded by brains, they would not store the entire index.xml, they would store only the subset describing the changes made between the two « Store A Version » task. This intelligent behavior is also required for an efficient iCloud compatibility.

I guess that revising the code is a huge task which explain why we don't see an updated set of apps.

I must add that maybe, behaving this intelligent way require features which would be available only in Mountain Lion. This is why I would not be surprised if the next major upgrade appear only after 10.8 delivery (with applications requiring this operating system).

I apologizes Peter but to learn all that, I used only the documents which everybody may reach. OK, it requires time but you aren't asked to do that by yourself, some fools like me did the job and shared their knowledge.

Isn't it the way all of us behave for years ?

When some one ask here where he may learn how to use Pages, I respond : in Pages User Guide but our dear Fruhulda respond that it would be fine to buy and study a book (I apologize Fruhulda but I forgot its title). This book was written like me which took time to study the app, the existing resources and tried to make his knowledge available in a book.

They are a few books about iWork apps, more about iLife's ones and a huge number about the operating system itself.

It's not Apple duty to deliver resources describing in detail what Unix do behind the curtain giving us a fine operating system.

I'm accustomed to read Peter ranting when I use the word « perfect ». I know that « well done » would be better but as you know, I'm lazy.

And now, I'm tired.

Just one more thing 😉

I see no valid reason why the user's library folder is hidden in Lion.

It's why I posted several time the huge script allowing us to unhide it.

Here it is again :

--{code}

do shell script "chflags nohidden ~/Library"

--{code}

From time to time, I unhide other items but, when I do that, I know what I'm doing.

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) mercredi 18 avril 2012

iMac 21”5, i7, 2.8 GHz, 12 Gbytes, 1 Tbytes, mac OS X 10.6.8 and 10.7.3

My Box account is : http://www.box.com/s/00qnssoyeq2xvc22ra4k

Hello

I would be grateful if somebody is fair enough to translate my long message in plain English 😉

Yvan KOENIG (VALLAURIS, France) mercredi 18 avril 2012

iMac 21”5, i7, 2.8 GHz, 12 Gbytes, 1 Tbytes, mac OS X 10.6.8 and 10.7.3

My Box account is : http://www.box.com/s/00qnssoyeq2xvc22ra4k

I'll do it for you Yvan.

"It just is, because it just is."

Peter

btw It appears that Apple may be reintroducing Save As… in Mountain Lion:

http://www.macworld.com/article/1165460/mountain_lion_what_you_need_to_know.html

…and judging by the comments under the article the growing disquiet about where Apple is headed is growing into a dull roar.

Steve Jobs isn't at Apple anymore to bind the troops to his Reality Distortion Field.

Peter

Hey Peter, I looked over the article and didn't see any reference to "save as"... where is it?

I saw it in the article that referred me there, and yes you are right, although I did not go through all the comments.

Peter

i don't have time to read all of this....is there any VERY QUICK way to turn this off [or turn back on SaveAs] in preferences, or a code thingy....anything? i'm so tired of having to go into TimeMachine to resave files i've 'accidentally' f-ed up because of this stupid new feature.

thanks!

The short answer is "no". You can't turn it off but you can revert to the earlier version of iWork and bypass it. Here is a link describing how to do that:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3267033?answerId=15949298022#15949298022

It is a bit of a bother but has worked flawlessly on my old macbook

You can wait for Mountain Lion for keyboard shortcut for Duplicate & Save As.

Try this, it works for me, and I am using Mountain Lion.

1. Go to the File pull down menu
2. Drag the mouse over "Duplicate to highlight "Duplicate". Don't click on it, just highlight it.
3. Press the command key, and while holding down the command key press the option key. Both keys should be pressed.
4. While these two keys are pressed, "Duplicate" will change to "Save As" in the file menu.
5. With the two keys held down, click on "Save As"
6. The "Save As" dialouge box will appear as hoped for, type in the new name, etc.

That's really all there is to it. Nothing to turn on or off, nothing to change in preferences, it works just like before. And you can do this at any time when you are editing the file.

didn't work for me. i'm on mac, 10.7.5 - pages 09, 4.3

That is because it is not Mountain Lion, which reintroduced the back door method of Save As, after howls of protest from users.

Peter

oh, thanks. buying Mountain Lion now. would pay $500 to get SAVE AS back [don't tell anyone]

No secret, Apple is getting close to that figure now on a wide range of its products.

It's hit on the brilliant idea of removing hardware/features and telling its users they don't need them despite all evidence to the contrary.

Then off handedly saying "You can always [Insert expensive, time wasting, broken and generally unavailable solution here}".

Peter

Thanks Alan, totally helped me out. Keep it up.