Q: Has Pages lost its Layout mode?

You turn off the text area (WP) to get the same effect as Layout mode, a move that makes sense.

Linking Textboxes appears to have been eliminated, a move that doesn't seem to make sense.

Peter

I miss Layout mode as well, I used it more than word processing. What I did was to take one of the included templates for a poster (I believe) and deleted all of the elements so it was totally blank. Then I saved this blank as a template (Save as Template) from the File Menu, so I had this choice what I open the program.

I'm disappointed if text box linking is gone - no logic in that.

I also miss the ability to delete and duplicate pages via the thumbnails sidebar - used that all the time in addition to the page guides you could pull off the rulers (and the vertical ruler for that fact!).

I'm hoping some of those features get added back into the program. Be sure to give Apple feedback! Pages 4.3 was a great fast alternative for word processing with a good responsive set of page layout tools that made the difference.

I like that the experience in all versions is getting as close as it can to build on the strengths of all, but not at the expense of features that may be only suited to one of the versions (desktop). Although, I'm glad the inspector panel has been integrated into the main window and is context sensitive now.

I repeat here what added to another post.

Having the movable Inspectors was one of the best features of iWork. The way it was implemented with the descending order of tabs should have been widely adopted. Not trashed.

I keep my Inspectors and other palettes on a second monitor to allow a full view of my work on the first.

Having an independent Inspector, one not tied to context, allows the User to look for information and options without losing what you are doing at the moment.

Contextual linking suffers from a major problem. You must know the exact selection/combination of actions to make the controls appear. In other words you must know the correctly worded question to get the answer.

Don't get the wording of the question exactly the way the programmers want it and you will never find the answer.

There are examples of that in Pages 4.3, other Apple software and many areas of OSX in recent times.

It is very bad User Interface Design to conceal the access to solutions.

Effectively you turn the software into an Easter Egg hunt. Something that seems to amuse the personalities who program, but not those who are using software to an end and not just playing games.

Peter

I feel your pain, Peter; and I appreciate all you have done in other threads to document the omissions from 4.3 to 5. It helps one's sanity to be able to view the list instead of constantly wondering why it used to do something before and not now.

I have to agree with much of your comment on the independent inspector. It certainly makes sense in your set up. But for me, I'm using the program on a Macbook Pro with just the laptop display and many times it seemed like more of an effort (additional steps) for me as it was always on a tab that wasn't what I was doing at the time. Of course I have only used Pages 5 sporadically at this point and I may rethink my opinion on more intensive use (as the contextual answers may not match my question!).

Also agreed I don't want to be hunting eggs when I'm trying to get things done! It was nice to at least see a number of inspector options were still there as when I was using the iCloud beta much was missing. But that gave me uneasiness that much would be missing from the desktop version if it was following the lead of the cloud. Of course the numerous topic threads generated by the discontented users attest the current status of things. I'm hoping that some features will get added back in, as I really liked the strong desktop publishing abilities of 4.3. I'm glad the previous version wasn't deleted in the update install.

We are in the fortunate position that we know what we are jumping into. Personally I have so many scars from Apple it is hard to get me to put my paw willingly into the trap.

There are quite a few people who have been caught out completely unawares by software that was pushed on them by Apple and had considerable work damaged. One had a thousand page book screwed up.

It is time to think what would Apple do if this happened to them.

Peter

<Edited By Host>

What do you think? Definitely progress.

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

Thaey have a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong way to go still.

This is the promise to give you back a very short list of features, 'sometime'.

Peter

Pages 4.3 is still in an iWork folder within your Application folder, and it still works.  Since Apple is now directing us towards it, it seems like it should be safe for some time yet.  At least six months, at which point they claim they'll have a lot of the functionality back.