Hi all-
Pages 5.5.3 on 10.10
Is it possible to add a specific zoom factor to the choices for zoom level?
An A4 sheet of paper in Pages on my particular iMac needs to be at about 152% to look like it is an A4 sheet on the screen.
150% is just a little too small, 200% is WAY too big.
From Googling I see a number of other complainers about this, but have found no solutions.
Anyone have input?
Thanks in advance!
iMac, OS X Yosemite (10.10), 27inch
The developers of Pages v5 (including 5.5.3) hard-coded the Zoom menu items, and did not create a provision for application, or programmatic user specified zoom overrides. AppleScript only allows you the ability to determine if the document window is zoomed, but no means to control that zoom.
In contrast to Pages v5, LibreOffice Writer not only has a zoom slider in the lower right document corner that provides zoom override, if you click on the reported zoom factor, it will pop a Zoom dialog per the following, and clearly illustrates that intelligence and user requirements were not squandered on this application.
Hi Nixt,
On a Mac, open System Preferences > Trackpad > Scroll & Zoom > Zoom in or out > Pinch with two fingers.
A bit tricky, but when you get the Zoom in Pages to 158% the screen display matches the actual width of an A4 piece of paper (portrait).
MacBook Pro (13 inch, Mid 2012 OS X 10.10.3)
Regards,
Ian.
Hi VikingOSX -
Just FYI for you (and happily for me) - Yellowbox found a way to get it to a non-coded value! (See below)
This hints at the possibility that the zoom factor CAN be controlled programmatically, if it were figured out how to send Pages the pinch-zoom signal...
Any Mac coders out there want to have a go at this?
YAY!
So on mine (iMac 27") the zoom factor that's closest to an actual A4 sheet is 152% - and the pinch-zoom works!!!
Thanks.
I am a little under 2mm off of a real representation of a document.
Not quite what I WANT, but close enough to work with.
Here's a schtick to Apple people that may chance upon this thread:
I have read WHY the "100%" value is so variable in on-screen appearance (72dpi). OK, I get that. For 1995.
But ***?
Why after all these years, with 1) SO much calculation power available in the computers, and screens that report back their settings, and 2) apps that know what they are displaying (paper size)... And 3) with most users using the word 'size' to describe real-life objects not data or pixels when thinking about a document made to print on a **** home printer...
WHY can't this app show an A4 at 100% and have it LOOK LIKE an A4 at 100% no matter which Mac you are using?
Really!
And yes, I have sent feedback via the proper channels.
I don't use a trackpad. Pages v5 was compiled with library code that allows it to respond to mouse and trackpad events. There are two mechanisms that one can use to control Pages programmatically. One is AppleScript, and the other is through the OS X Scripting bridge which presently supports Objective-C, Python/Objective-C, and JavaScript for Automation.
However, all of these depend on scripting definitions that Apple has built into Pages. Those definitions do not provide for the ability to set a specific Zoom value, or I would have already posted the code to do that.
You can also get arbitrary zoom percentages by setting the Zoom to Fit Width and adjusting the width of the window. The exact number you want will depend on the pixel resolution of your monitor. My monitor has about 91 pixels per inch, so I need 91/72 which equals 126%.
AppleScript can get and set the bounds for the window, and with user interface scripting, can choose Fit Width. On my monitor, the following AppleScript sets a Pages document to display "real" inches instead of "screen" inches:
tell application "Pages"
tell front window
set Origbounds to get bounds
set Newbounds to {20, item 2 of Origbounds, 1079, item 4 of Origbounds}
set bounds to Newbounds
end tell
end tell
tell application "System Events"
-- Click the “100%” menu button.
clickmenu button "100%" of group 2 of toolbar 1 of front window of application process "Pages"
-- Fit Width
clickmenu item "Fit Width" of menu 1 of menu button "100%" of group 2 of toolbar 1 of front window of application process "Pages"
end tell
The hardcoded bounds values are particular to my monitor; yours would be different. A script like this could be run from the Scripts menu or turned into a Service and given a keyboard shortcut. I would imagine it would break if the Inspector width were changed.
Set zoom factor to represent actual size?
