iPad Pages - worthless or really truly worthless?
I was reading reviews about Pages and was amazed how crippled the app is. It can't import Pages desktop documents.(edit : I believe only Pages 09 work) Seriously? No MobileMe iDisk support. Pay $100 a year for that?
For something that is supposed to be widely adapted by universities, it also has no footnotes support which makes it useless for real academic or legal work. Either limited or no equation support, so it's a no go for science, engineering, or math.
And most shockingly no word count? Wow. That's a joke right? Didn't word processors have that 20 years ago (at least).
I could add no printing suport, but I'm sure that will be addressed in OS 4. There's a lot of other limitations as well but these really stood out. I'm sure many of these will be eventually addressed but I didn't think it would be this bad.
For something that is supposed to be widely adapted by universities, it also has no footnotes support which makes it useless for real academic or legal work. Either limited or no equation support, so it's a no go for science, engineering, or math.
And most shockingly no word count? Wow. That's a joke right? Didn't word processors have that 20 years ago (at least).
I could add no printing suport, but I'm sure that will be addressed in OS 4. There's a lot of other limitations as well but these really stood out. I'm sure many of these will be eventually addressed but I didn't think it would be this bad.
Comments
FWIW, I never heard that Pages is "supposed to be widely adapted by universities." Maybe you could point out where that claim was made.
It's v1 software, it's been out for five days, it costs $10. I'm withholding my opinion about what it is worth, until I spend more time with it.
FWIW, I never heard that Pages is "supposed to be widely adapted by universities." Maybe you could point out where that claim was made.
I was referring to the iPad moreso than Pages. But Pages will likely be the main word processor on iPad unless MS releases Word. I've seen many articles and discussions about the iPad becoming an essential educational tool. One college is already planning to give them out to incoming students.
Like I said, I'm sure there will be improvements, but given the almost unprecented hype and predictions that iPad will render laptops obsolete, it's fair game to point out its major weaknesses. No word count would like if the letter 'z' wasn't supported -it's that big of an omission. And who knows how long the improvements will take? Six months, a year, longer
I was referring to the iPad moreso than Pages. But Pages will likely be the main word processor on iPad unless MS releases Word. I've seen many articles and discussions about the iPad becoming an essential educational tool. One college is already planning to give them out to incoming students.
Like I said, I'm sure there will be improvements, but given the almost unprecented hype and predictions that iPad will render laptops obsolete, it's fair game to point out its major weaknesses. No word count would like if the letter 'z' wasn't supported -it's that big of an omission. And who knows how long the improvements will take? Six months, a year, longer
Another claim lacking real substance. Nobody who thinks, thinks the iPad is meant "render laptops obsolete." It is intended to be a new class of devices.
I don't know what college is giving them to students, or why -- but perhaps it's for some other application, not Pages? Reading text books, perhaps?
Yes, it is fair game to point out weaknesses. I've done some of that myself. What is not fair game is selecting random bits of hype and trying to spin them into the real story.
I know I'm patiently waiting for the next upgrade and chances are some of the issues with the iPad versions and the Mac version should be dealt with.