iWork for iCloud beta

Question

Level 1

18 points

iWork for iCloud beta

I apologize in advance for this simple question but I am trying to figure out the advantages of working in the cloud versus just working on your Mac. What sorts of situations would this really be useful? Before beta, everything was syncing up just great. (I'm sure there must be some great advantage but I just am too much a novice to know.) I want to see the bigger picture here so I fully understand what is being offered. As it is, I can only see that it would be useful if I do a lot of work from various sites using different computers in which case being able to work in the cloud would be convenient as I wouldn't have to carry my computer everywhere. But is there anything else? I worry I'm missing some important point. Thanks for your help.

MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012), iOS 6.1.4

Posted on Jul 21, 2013 9:32 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

115,952 points

Jul 21, 2013 1:28 PM in response to Tara 9

As I understand it a major advantage is that neither you nor anyone else you want to share your work with needs to have iWork apps on your machine (which is not even possible for Windows or Linux). All you need is a browser to create docs, convert them to other formats, and to email them or provide links to them and maybe print them for other people.

Reply

Answer 2

Jul 21, 2013 9:35 PM in response to Tara 9

The advantage is that you do not need to install the apps on the client - it all runs on the server. Users can attach with any Apple device that meets the requirements, MackBook, iPad, iPhone, etc.

There is one problem that I see- the amount of storage required to run it. Its on the server but - I now have 0.1 GB of my 5GB iCloud. 4.99 got eaten up quickly.

Hope this helps!!!

Reply

Answer 3

Tom Gewecke

Level 10

115,952 points

Jul 22, 2013 2:49 AM in response to BrooklynShades

BrooklynShades wrote:

Users can attach with any Apple device that meets the requirements, MackBook, iPad, iPhone, etc.

That's not correct. You can't use an iPad or iPhone. But you can use a non-Apple machine with a supported browser.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5436

Reply

Answer 4

Jul 22, 2013 3:55 AM in response to Tom Gewecke

Wow --- I see your reply --- Forgive me!!! I looked for the article that included the iOS devices and its gone --- bad info again. I guess we can't really trust info found on the internet without confirming it first.

Thanks.

Reply

Answer 5

Tara 9 Author

Level 1

18 points

Jul 22, 2013 7:06 AM in response to Tara 9

Thank you both for your help. I can see the advantage clearly now. It is a great option to have.

The only drawback I can see is for those of us who live in an area where internet access is still unreliable (although now that we have a hotspot with our phone we are somewhat better off). Our household wifi can be slow and our cell tower is subject to high winds so working exclusively on the web would be nervewracking.

Otherwise, this is simply fabulous to know we have the freedodm to work from any supported browser. Thanks again!

Reply

Answer 6

Aug 8, 2013 1:04 PM in response to Tara 9

Honestly, the advantage for me is that I can finally synch/access all of my Pages documents through iCloud. Prior to this beta, that just wasn't happening.

Reply