The Best of Both Phone, and Tablet
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"pages underrated" on by alistaire
Pros: solid, clean word processing for 99% of the typing anyone does
Cons: no foreign language spell/grammar checks
Summary: I thought the review of Pages was rather harsh; it is the best word processor I've found that balances powerful features with a clean interface. It is simple to use (unlike Word), completely compatible with almost every format available, and has enough features to make most anything (I would call it to be more of a cross between Word and Publisher than just a strait up word processor). I use it for everything except typing papers in foreign languages, for which I find Word's spelling and grammar checks useful (though still very flawed). I would (and have) still recommend this program to anyone besides the most ardent formatters and publishers.
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"sloppy Keynote review" on by jameyfrank
Pros: great graphics and effects
Cons: Pages formatting takes getting used to
Summary: CNET's review is incomplete and sloppy...how can you list this as a "downside" when you haven't even tested this?:
"Past versions of Keynote have had some problems in sharing presentations with Windows-based computers; it's not clear if Keynote 3 fixes this." -
"A lot of these faults aren't iWork's fault" on by steviesteveo
Pros: Keynote - better than Powerpoint
Cons: Not installed on every single windows PC (or any)
Summary: I don't see how cnet can blame Keynote presentations for losing features that Powerpoint doesn't support when importing to that format, it's like expecting Word to save formatting when important to .txt format, it's just a different, somewhat more advanced technology and the backward compability is included as a convenient way of displaying and editing presentations on a Windows PC as long as the presentation creator is ok with losing the cooler features. if you want a true keynote presentation, give it from a computer running keynote
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"The Best MS Office Alternative So Far, Too Bad It Still Isn't Great" on by britishboy5
Pros: Low Price, Clean Interface, MS Office Compatible, Integration with iLife and Other Apps, Creates Beautiful Documents
Cons: Clean Interface Causes Inconvenience, Slow Typing in Pages, Lacks Some of Word's Formatting Options
Summary: When I bought my new Intel iMac, I knew I would need some type of productivity software. It was between iWork and MS Office. I chose iWork because it was cheaper and Apple made it (so I thought it would work better on the Mac).
iWork was designed as Apple's competition to Office. iWork is fully compatible with MS Office and can perform many of the same functions. It is made up of two programs; Pages (a word processor and publication program) and Keynote (a PowerPoint-like presentation maker).
Pages is the program that I knew I would be using the most and that may be why I was most disappointed with it. Upon opening the application, you are asked whether you want to start with a blank document or use a template. The templates are really nice and would be great if somebody wanted to make a newsletter, brochure, etc. I needed to type a report and so I chose "Blank Document."
I'm used to using Work on a PC, so Pages was quite different. It is slow to register your keystrokes, which is pretty bad. I'm not a very fast typer and it is still very frustrating. Also, Font adjustments must be made through the Text Window. I miss the drop down menus for font styles and buttons for making text bold, underlined, centered, etc.
Pictures from iPhoto can easily be added using the media window. Using the Inspector you can adjust several features and even add that desk relection that you see so much in OS X. Formatting options included auto-numbering and bulleting. Pages includes a real-time spell checker and can automatically correct capitalization. I had to turn off auto caps, however, because it capitalizes words that don't need to be capitalized. For example, it would alway capitalize "may," thinking I meant the month. Even though the sentence may have read "I may do that tomorrow."
Though a spreadsheet program is not included, you can make tables and graphs within Pages and even perform basic calculations. Pages documents can be exported as a PDF, Word document, web page, and more.
Keynote is much better. I found that Keynote actually is better than PowerPoint. Presentations simply look for professional. Like Pages, the media window can be used to add pictures, but you can also add music from iTunes or videos from iMovie. Fonts must be adjusted through the Text Window, but it isn't as big of a deal in a program like this. You can export Keynote presentations as Quicktime movies, Flash documents, PowerPoint documents, an iDVD project, and more. So your presentation should be viewable on any computer. I also like the way Keynote works with the Apple remote.
My conclusion?
For a basic home user, iWork would be fine. For the price ($50 with student discount) it is a great deal. Though it includes only two programs, it can perform most of the functions of Word, Excel, Publisher, and PowerPoint. Professional users, especially those needing a good spreadsheet program, need to look elsewhere. -
"Haphazard review at best by cnet" on by benleeisgreat
Pros: Excellent productivity suite encompassing powerful word processing, graphic design, and presentation software with an excellent easy-to-use interface.
Cons: Still waiting for a spreadsheet program to give Office the boot.
Summary: The cnet reviewer was dangerously negligent in her review. Pull up the inspector panel in pages. What is that on the very first tab (Document)? Oh, a footnote tab? With stylesheet options? Maybe if she'd provided any valuable criticism of the software to justify it's low marks I'd digest this more easily. I'm just a college student, after all. But footnoting is hugely important for me and rather than creating features the software lacks she could have focused on actual issues.
Slow to register typing? Well, if the reviewer benchmarks off of her aging 12" G4 powerbook maybe, but on my new iMac it's (pardon the cliche) snappy. Pages is everything Word should be: powerful and easy to use, revealing new features as you look for them, not bombarding you with endless toolbars and buttons you don't need.
In short: I like Pages and it more than justifies the $49 (student) price tag on its own for iWork. Keynote is great but I don't use it much honestly. Someday I will need to but the press on that one is all good. I mainly wanted to clear up a shoddy pages review. PEACE.
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