iOS Pages Won't Sync, but Numbers Does
Those of you out there who have problems with iOS iWork (Pages, Keynote, and/or Numbers) not syncing documents you have stored in iCloud—I assume you are here because you have already tried things such as:
- Verified icloud.com shows your documents.
- Restarted iOS Device.
- Disabled and enabled iCloud Data & Documents.
- Turned off iCloud and then turned it back on.
- Some combination of the above.
...and you're still having trouble. Well, when things in iOS-land get horked, the easiest fix is sometimes to take the following steps:
- Make a backup. If you backup to iTunes, restore should be faster, but iCloud backups are fine (I usually use iCloud backups). Make sure you have a backup before proceeding to step 2.
- For iTunes, plug the device in, open iTunes, right-click your device in the Devices list, and choose Backup.
- For iCloud, go to Settings->iCloud->Storage & Backup, and choose to backup now.
- Erase all the content and settings of your iOS device. Almost all applications store their settings and data correctly so they will survive a backup/restore. Settings->General->Reset (last item)->Erase All Content and Settings.
- When the erase is done, follow the instructions to restore your iOS device from the backup you made.
Yeah, it feels a little risky, but it fixes the vast majority of the iOS quirks that I've come across so far.
In the earlier days of Mac OS X, users were often instructed to throw away .plist files to reset features to get things working again. These sporadic iOS issues feel very similar, but we don't have access to the filesystem to reset things and the options we do have control over don't always clean up after themselves.
Hope this helps someone.
