Q: Pages 5 features checklist
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Nov 18, 2013 3:02 AMby Hirschkorn,robogobo, here's the way I see things.
I use Pages for work (work meaning "making money with it") and, even if it wasn't officially designated so by Apple, it is a pro app for anyone that really knows the app's actual capabilities. With these changes from version '09 to version '13, I have two options: clinging to '09 and hoping they will eventually update '13 to include everything they removed, or moving to another app (not really a word processor, more like a DTP app): InDesign or Quark.
And that means losing time and money (buying apps, time needed for learning them exhaustively) and my whole Pages work archive becoming useless.
More than that, Apple is keeping mum on the future: they'll add "some" functions back but, beyond that, it's just "hey, take a wild guess, guys!"
So you'll probably understand why "optimism" is not really the first thing that comes to mind in this — artificially created — Pages 5.0 situation.
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Nov 18, 2013 4:00 AMby Magnus Lewan,Peter,
That is not what I intended to say. What I intended to say was that Apple has made a big investment in Pages 5, and that they see some future for Pages. Nothing more.
I have not changed my other opinions: One should never keep any document in only Pages format, regardless of version, but always keep a backup in other formats. Apple will probably abandon Pages one day (even if it will not be in the near future), and that will leave piles of unreadable documents on hard disks all over the world just like for HyperCard, AppleWorks and the rest. I have never used Pages as my main word processor and that will not change with Pages 5.
Magnus
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Nov 18, 2013 7:30 AMby PeterBreis0807,robo
Your answer is submit and hope for the best. Haven't got it in the past, but you are 10,000% certain this time will be different
You have not put forward one pertinent answer to any of these problems created by Apple, other than "Leave it up to Apple". The very people who created the totally unnecessary crisis.
I deliberately restrained from immediately answering your posts because there really is nothing to them and they go around in circles, never answering anything.
But my restraint was like my running a forum for no other purpose than to support iWork users. Or offering support here.
So, sooooooooo suspicious. Certainly not something you would do.
Peter
<Edited By Host>
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Nov 18, 2013 4:22 AMby PeterBreis0807,Magnus
I agree with what you say, we rarely differ, but not the ultimate conclusion.
Apple got us on this ship with all sorts of promises and enticements.
Steve Jobs in fact made a crack when he took over Apple the second time, "Apple is like a ship with a hole in the bottom, leaking water… and my job is to get it pointed in the right direction."
We could all laugh because we knew he was there to fix the hole. This occassion we are not laughing because there is no hole, but all of us who stood by Apple when it needed us, are being thrown overboard, as Apple goes off looking for other paying passengers.
Quite rightly we are feeling had.
Peter
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Nov 18, 2013 4:31 AMby Tristan Hubsch,Magnus Lewan wrote:
[...] One should never keep any document in only Pages format, regardless of version, but always keep a backup in other formats. [...]
Brilliant suggestion in principle—always have a "Plan B" transition option open, but how does that work in practice? How do you do this for documents that use Pages '09 functionality to the hilt (say, a newsletter/report with text columns linked accross pages, some charts rotated and tables with in-line images, and "mail-merged" to be mailed to a list of customers, for starters)? Would you mind sharing your other-format backup strategy? Which other OSX (or Windows or Linux) programs include all the Pages '09 functionality and permit a lossless format translation?
The readers of this Forum would appreciate concrete solutions.
[Seems like a functionality and format-translation comparison would be really useful (in a separate location).]
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Nov 18, 2013 4:33 AMby PeterBreis0807,Actually Magnus I'll give my understanding of what Apple is doing with the new iWork.
They are using it as the bait for iOS users just as they used it as the bait for OSX users.
The iOS users are new to Apple and know nothing of it's history of abandoning users, without notice when it suits it.
They are fresh meat, and easy pickings. They haven't heard the spin a dozen times before and won't wake up before they too get it in the neck.
Peter
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Nov 18, 2013 4:38 AMby PeterBreis0807,Tristan
I am working on the last point but it is a huge job. Building a safety net out of whatever is available.
Might be time to get everyone searching and putting forward suggestions.
I see the major problem that for us the solutions still involve the Apple Mac platform and Apple has just done to that what it has done to iWork.
Peter
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Nov 18, 2013 4:48 AMby Robson,PeterBreis0807 wrote:
Actually Magnus I'll give my understanding of what Apple is doing with the new iWork.
They are using it as the bait for iOS users just as they used it as the bait for OSX users.
The iOS users are new to Apple and know nothing of it's history of abandoning users, without notice when it suits it.
They are fresh meat, and easy pickings. They haven't heard the spin a dozen times before and won't wake up before they too get it in the neck.
Peter
You really are into conspiracy theories.
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Nov 18, 2013 5:00 AMby Magnus Lewan,Tristan,
There is no magic bullet, I'm afraid. My personal strategy is to stay away from features that do not translate to other products. That's why I'm not sad to see linked text boxes or mail merge disappear. I would never have used Pages for that in the first place.
To be fair, this is not only an Apple problem. I have been burnt by Microsoft as well in the past. I have lost incompatible macros and my attempts at using Word's "master documents" have been a complete failure.
For some reason I trust Adobe and InDesign's file format with linked text boxes, but they may also burn me one day. Who knows?
Magnus
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Nov 18, 2013 5:11 AMby PeterBreis0807,Magnus
Adobe lets you open old files without destroying them, even Quark XPress and PageMaker files, and offers you a text export feature to get the text out of those linked textboxes.
The images imported into Indesign aren't locked in and untrackable, and Adobe actually seems to want their customers to use their software to its fullest.
Peter
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Nov 18, 2013 6:08 AMby Tristan Hubsch,Hirschkorn wrote:
I use Pages for work (work meaning "making money with it") and, even if it wasn't officially designated so by Apple, it is a pro app for anyone that really knows the app's actual capabilities. With these changes from version '09 to version '13, I have two options: clinging to '09 and hoping they will eventually update '13 to include everything they removed, or moving to another app (not really a word processor, more like a DTP app): InDesign or Quark.
And that means losing time and money (buying apps, time needed for learning them exhaustively) and my whole Pages work archive becoming useless.
More than that, Apple is keeping mum on the future: they'll add "some" functions back but, beyond that, it's just "hey, take a wild guess, guys!"
To all pro users of Pages '09: please understand that you will never be able to make lite (& non-)users understand this crucial point; don't waste your (virtual) breath and bandwidth. So, could we please fous on the original intention of this thread—cataloguing the functionality gained/lost/changed in the Pages '09 → Pages '13 upgrade, and explore possible workarounds? Thank you, all.
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Nov 18, 2013 6:27 AMby Tristan Hubsch,PeterBreis0807 wrote:
I am working on the last point but it is a huge job. Building a safety net out of whatever is available.
Thank you! (I see that there is a pretty good reason for you having 100x more kudos points than bumble lil' ole me, myself and I together .)
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Nov 18, 2013 6:39 AMby j kfrommorgantown,Are you kidding?
you said:
...I have not changed my other opinions: One should never keep any document in only Pages format, regardless of version, but always keep a backup in other formats.....
First, do you actually run a business? or are you like these kids who write these programs? Nobody in a practical sense has time in a daily workflow to created docuements under time restraints and then create backups in various forms through other wordprocessors.
And in addition.... how? None of the formats are compatable with other formats. So you add yet additional time (billable time to the company) recreating the same document as a 'backup' in some other software. No matter how you try, the documents won't be the same anyway.
