Bug using a Wacom Intous Pen Tablet with iWork?

I can appreciate your predicament with Pages, but I see no effective, vendor resolution, other than your own adaptation:

1. Another word processing application where the Wacom tablet works properly.
2. A separate (left-handed) input device that works properly with your version of Pages.

   Or, a newer Wacom hardware/driver solution that works with Pages — if said hardware exists

You are asking for a technical answer to a problem that only the Pages or Wacom product teams can address. As fellow users, we have no access too, nor can we speak/speculate for either product team. Apple's product teams neither read nor participate in these Google archived, user-to-user support communities.

Use an Apple mouse, or Apple trackpad. Using the same products repetitively expecting a different result is just a gnawing source of frustration. Life is too short. It is not Apple's responsibility to make Wacom products compatible with Pages. Wacom will not have access to Pages source code, or document encoding.

You can ask Wacom support if their devices/drivers are tested against Apple's Pages product. Since it is a word processor, and not a high-end, Adobe product that would benefit from a Wacom solution, they will likely say no.

Hi Yarramalong,

You wrote: "Wacom tablets are not just another HW, they are the main input device for the core professional users of Apple products."

While I, like Viking, appreciate your predicament, I would be surprised to learn that "the core professional users of Apple products" depend on the obviously consumer level products in the iWork set of applications.

(Keynote is a possible exception to that statement, depending how it has fared since the last version I looked at.)

Regards,

Barry

This issue developed two years ago. Like you I developed RSI (twelve years ago) while using an Apple Mouse and since then I introduced Wacom Intuos tablets at my Architecture office on eight CAD workstations. I banned any extended use of the mouse in my office to avoid liability for any potential future health claims. The Wacom tablets are also indispensable for extended CAD/drawing use (an Apple trackpad is not useable for that purpose) and we naturally also use them for Pages, Numbers, Keynote etc. This bug is a problem for our workflow and has caused reduced productivity. It is also infuriating on a day to day basis as you switch between applications and get different behaviours. We have reverted to Word/Excel as a workaround, but are stuck with a lot of document templates in Pages and Numbers. I took it up with Wacom a year ago and persisted in chasing them for several months. I got the following response in June 2017:

emeasupport@wacom.com

Thank you for your answer.

The issue that you are experiencing with the text selection in iWorks was reported to our Senior Technical Support Specialist. Currently, our dev team is working with Apple team for resolution. The next driver update might come out with the solution.

Hoping for your understanding with this issue.

Kind regards,

Tamara
Customer Support Team
WACOM
+44 (0)207 744 08 31

Since then there has been no response and the updates have not fixed it - I do not even know if Wacom are still working on it - it was reported they said at one point it was because Apple changed their system and the pen registers two clicks instead of one when selecting text. It does not sound technically insuperable, but I think they lack the will to resolve it. I suggest contacting Wacom at emeasupport@wacom.com if you have not already done so and I will start chasing them again as well.

Charles

Oh by the way I have a (slightly) sophisticated workaround for you. If you hold down "Shift" and select the selection sticks, so for the iWorks Apps I have programmed the button on the stylus, which is normally set for right-click to "Shift". I can then hold down the button and select text. There is a technique to it (Raise the stylus away from the tablet before releasing the button), it is still rubbish to have to do this, but it is a slight improvement in my view on holding "shift" on the keyboard to select.