Q: Pages 5.0 - No mail merge?!

Not saying Apple will hit a wall in the near future, you are right it is extremely well cashed up, but nearly every hardware or software product is turning a corner now and Apple may have peaked.

In Lawrence of Arabia* Allenby asks Brighton where Lawrence and the Arab Army are during the wild battles in northern Palestine.

Brighton: Can only know that by being with them, sir.…

Allenby: Cocky?

Brighton: More than cocky, sir. He's got the bit between his teeth. All right. I tell you, sir, I think he'll get to Damascus before we do, unless...

It is the unless… with Android that has got Apple seriously worried.

Whether ditching its long suffering existing users and going yet again for the Dumb and Dumber is going to prove a winner we can only wait and find out.

Peter

PS In an historical sidenote, the Aussies beat Lawrence to Damascus. The Turks surrendered to the Australian Light Horse who were already heading north when Lawrence and the Arab National Council followed and took over the city with disastrous results.

There is a temporary solution if you don't mind going back to Pages '09 with your new Pages 5 document.  Pages 5.0 gives you a choice export your Pages 5 document as "Pages '09".  Export as "Pages '09" (make sure to label it as created for merging) and then open in previous version of Pages.  Updating to Pages 5 did not destroy your previous 4.3 version.  It's in your apps!

Now! If you were using a Numbers spreadsheet for your data source, and have also upgraded to the newer version on Numbers, you can follow the same workflow.  You will have to export your spreadsheet as Numbers '09 and use that as your merge source.  SO you will have to continue to open and work with your Pages '09 and Numbers '09 documents to do your merges until Apples provides us an update containing a mail merge workflow.  Ugly I know, but it will tie you over.  Apple never leaves you hangin' forever.

…another really bad idea…

You'll be able collect these soon as cards.

Unbelievable!  Merge is not just for businesses... I use it for Christmas Cards.  Plenty of home or person situations need merge capabilities (party invites, christmas cards, etc).  Can't believe this is not supported in new Pages.  I just got a new MacBook Pro and therefore the older version of iworks that everyone is talking about as a solution doesn't even work for me.  New macs don't ship with old software!  HELP!  This is ridiculous!

Let Apple know out in public (otherwise it is totally ignored) by rating/reviewing Pages 5 in the App Store.

Peter

I don't mean to sound callus but I fail to see what the big deal is if you can still do it in Pages '09. It'll likely be included in the next major update.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6049

John P. wrote:

 

I don't mean to sound callus but I fail to see what the big deal is if you can still do it in Pages '09. It'll likely be included in the next major update.

 

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6049

You did read the list?

Not mentioned. I wouldn't hold my breath waiting.

Peter

Actually my original point was merely a minor critique, one that questioned the wisdom of vascilating over a temporary issue.

Perhaps we should revisit what was implied in the original link... Emphasis mine.

In rewriting these applications, some features from iWork ’09 were not available for the initial release. We plan to reintroduce some of these features in the next few releases and will continue to add brand new features on an ongoing basis.

 

 

Some features in upcoming releases in the next 6 months

Maybe you read something different but I did not find it difficult to scrutinize this otherwise carefully worded statement.

Some of us are simply not interested in second-guessing the inferences of Apple's statements regarding the new iWork in the hope mail merge may or may not reappear. Some of us are in the market for a new computer and need to perform mail merges. Purchasing a new Mac will not allow this unless you buy an old CD copy of Pages 09 or use a competitive word processor. That's a pretty unsatisfactory "solution", especially if the Mac we want to buy has no optical drive.

Referring back to a previous post of mine, I find myself in a situation where I can't in all conscience recommend my father moves from Windows to Mac, simply because his core - and arguably pretty basic - computing needs can't be met by a new Mac without the kind of faffing that Macs are supposed to eliminate.

Looks like an aging Windows XP laptop and Word for him then...

stilltortoise wrote:

 

Some of us are simply not interested in second-guessing the inferences of Apple's statements regarding the new iWork in the hope mail merge may or may not reappear. Some of us are in the market for a new computer and need to perform mail merges. Purchasing a new Mac will not allow this unless you buy an old CD copy of Pages 09 or use a competitive word processor. That's a pretty unsatisfactory "solution", especially if the Mac we want to buy has no optical drive.

 

Referring back to a previous post of mine, I find myself in a situation where I can't in all conscience recommend my father moves from Windows to Mac, simply because his core - and arguably pretty basic - computing needs can't be met by a new Mac without the kind of faffing that Macs are supposed to eliminate.

 

Looks like an aging Windows XP laptop and Word for him then...

That's not "second-guessing" but what was posted on the link. However, if your argument is simply one of "I believe, therefore, it is," I suggest not don't buy a Mac, or Apple products in general; OpenOffice is also free.

Problem solved... No kvetching needed, especially over a free product.

 

John P. wrote:

 

Actually my original point was merely a minor critique, one that questioned the wisdom of vascilating over a temporary issue.

 

 

You have no way of knowing this is a "temporary issue" nor how long "temporary" is. Especially with Apple's history on these things.

One thing Apple's track record does point to, is a total disregard for Users and their work as well as well as only fleeting and occassional interest in various products, followed by prolonged periods of neglect.

Saying this has been described as rude by a few Apple sycophants, but I'd argue that a supplier surreptitiously entering your place of work and trashing all your work, throwing your business in disarray, is way beyond "rude".

Peter

Pages is not a profesional level word processor at this time. A 90's copy of Word Perfect will do things that this app won't do...

PeterBreis0807 wrote:

 

 

John P. wrote:

 

Actually my original point was merely a minor critique, one that questioned the wisdom of vascilating over a temporary issue.

 

 

 

You have no way of knowing this is a "temporary issue" nor how long "temporary" is. Especially with Apple's history on these things.

 

One thing Apple's track record does point to, is a total disregard for Users and their work as well as well as only fleeting and occassional interest in various products, followed by prolonged periods of neglect.

 

Saying this has been described as rude by a few Apple sycophants, but I'd argue that a supplier surreptitiously entering your place of work and trashing all your work, throwing your business in disarray, is way beyond "rude".

 

Peter

Dude--do you need a hug?

Just go buy a Windows PC if you're not jaded.

I think for most people who have made comment on here - we want to buy Apple products because we like them and after all we have spent plenty of money to get the hardware. However when something like this happens we feel not only angry and frustrated but also confused. Yes we can use the 09 version but it does not feel comfortable knowing that we are not using the latest version. Returning to Windows is not an option and using Office is not what most of us want to do. We write these posts so that it is known in the media and hopefully within Apple that a lot of Apple customers are unhappy and feel offended. I say offended because creating an update that loses lots of functions is obviously going to upset people but Apple did it without any warning. It causes some problems having two versions of software for example when you click on the document to open it, it will sometimes open the new versions. So it is a messy situation that we need to complain about in the 'hope' that it comes right in the end.

I do agree Brian - I can't imagine going back to windows, even if the new commericals make it appealing.

I just saw this update from Apple:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6049?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

Its a nov 11 support article titled: About the new iWork for Mac: Features and compatibility.

It includes Pages adding many features back within six months but doesn't mention Mailmerge.

I believe we all should abandon our hope that they will add it back as it was, or that it will ever be as functional as MS Office.  They are undoubtably trying to reimagine how we might accomplish this task. And the young product managers at Apple, I'm sure, are not interested in a use case of printing a mailing of letters.  They are thinking that Christmas cards will come out of iPhoto, leveraging a third party to mail them. They are thinking mass mailings will either go to email or some sort of cloud based distribution we haven't thought of (maybe a link to a web page or shared document?). It's probably too hard for them to imagine doing a mass mailing from an iPad so they frankly don't want to give it too many thoughts. They probably wonder why we aren't using email programs like MailChimp or servics for direct mail like http://www.everydoordirectmail.com