I wonder why? Really, they are both great programs.
Keynote is great. Pages is great too, it is just that it is a littile more difficult to work with after using MS Word for 200 years.
What does Apple have to do to make iWork king, at least in the Mac world?
Comments
How well did Keynote sell when it was standalone?
If Apple thought they were going to create the colored iMac of software with iWork they severely misunderstand what people need in a "productivity" app.
Sure make it nice looking but functionality must reign supreme over all else. Pages has functionality but it's not evident from simply firing up the app and taking a whirl sans manual.
Apple needs to go back to the drawing board and
1. Complete the suite with DB and Spreadsheet.
2. Modify the UI so that it's evident what features can be applied. Offer customizing tha tailores the UI the way the end user needs to work.
3. Add Tiger enabled functions.
Originally posted by Kishan
. . . By the by, back when I last used Macs (early 90's), there was this thing called Claris Works. Does this still exist?
Yes, but the name was changed to Apple Works several years ago, when Apple brought the software back in house from Claris, which was a company Apple owned. That company may be independent of Apple now, not sure, and their only product is File Maker.
I believe Apple Works will be phased out eventually. I have iWork but it is on a G5 Power Mac, which I seldom get to use. When I get a Mac mini for the office here I'll use Pages. This old beige G3 will not run it and I use Claris Works 4 and TextEdit. Do you believe that?
Originally posted by snoopy
Yes, but the name was changed to Apple Works several years ago, when Apple brought the software back in house from Claris, which was a company Apple owned. That company may be independent of Apple now, not sure, and their only product is File Maker.
....
FileMaker is owned by Apple.
a) a version for windows, most people will still use MS office (many illegaly) because it is cross platform
b) there is a decent spreadsheet app
c) there is a document/presentation viewer for mac and windows that is as ubiquitous as (or maybe included with) Quicktime player
d) huge mind share is won: when teachers/bosses say "make a powerpoint", that isnt like sayiong get a coke where a pepsi could suffice, they mean that what you make better damn well run in MS powerpoint flawlessly...untill Apple can defeate this mindset...it is a noshow
and even then, Dont expect a mass switch to iwork because real pros and even many home users have a ton of office docs, and IF they were to leave the office platform, it would be for a real productivity app like open office, which isnt ready for prime time yet...but it is getting there.
And when openoffice does mature, how can Apples $79 consumer solution compete with a free solution with damn near the same feature set of Office Pro (sans access...but OOo db is coming, albeit slowly, but it is comeing.)
Originally posted by AquaMac
When people move from Wintel systems and they have MS Office can they get the Mac OS Office at a discount? If so then that might be why IWork sales are slow.
Many vendors like Adobe and macromedia will do a 1 - for - 1 trade of mac for PC licenses and vice versa, but since MS staggers the versions of office, Mac and pc never get the same version number, so I doubt they trade at all
Of course it's also possible that people just don't want to deal with trying to share documents between Pages and Office. Those doc files aren't exactly an open standard, and how many users have the time to meticulously test every Pages document in Office to be sure it opens right on their coworkers' crapware? I know I'll be sticking with Office for the foreseeable future because of this very reason, I MUST be able to share files with Wintel users, and since doc is a closed standard, it is impossible for Apple to guarantee full compatibility.
It's too bad because every time I use Office, I think about what a bloated piece of crapware it is. Office to me feels like a giant heap of roughshod features designed by committee with no thought as to how well they work together. Most features are HARD WORK to learn how to use, and are aimed at business dorks with background in math or science (or anything), meaning that I have to constantly translate between real math and Office's business-speak for different graphs and functions. But mostly I just hate that Office has so freakin' many features that are implemented in such mind-bendingly complex ways. It like, instead of establishing a core feature set and then refining it, Microsoft instead chose to dump resources into cramming as many new features as possible into every release while ignoring all the established features. Reminds me of how my dog leaves a bunch of half-eaten bones strewn about the place and buried all over the yard, instead of finishing one bone completely and then moving on to the next!
1. Option of using a more tradition Appleworks/Office GUI.
2. Light duty spreadsheet, database, and drawing/painting programs. They don't have to much improved over AppleWorks in terms of features, they just have to actually be there.
3. Onscreen spelling/grammer check. Text edit has this, MSWorks has this, why doesn't iWork. I know some of you are annoyed by this, but its a lot easier to turn it off in preferences than for us who use it to not have it.
4. Apple to stop overthinking on things. You know the old addage "if its not broke don't fix it?", Apple has a tendency to try to fix it so much that it breaks.
Originally posted by BenRoethig
What does iWork needs.
1. Option of using a more tradition Appleworks/Office GUI.
The only advantage to having a different app from Office is that it works differently from Office. If Pages just copied Office's GUI, it would be just another pale Office clone that generated incompatible files.
3. Onscreen spelling/grammer check. Text edit has this, MSWorks has this, why doesn't iWork. I know some of you are annoyed by this, but its a lot easier to turn it off in preferences than for us who use it to not have it.
Pages has the same spell-check as TextEdit. And, like TextEdit, it has no grammar check, which is a pretty annoying feature anyway. One of the problems with this kind of feature-bloat is that, like Office, it's so much trouble to change preferences.
People who need that many options should stick with MS Office.
4. Apple to stop overthinking on things. You know the old addage "if its not broke don't fix it?", Apple has a tendency to try to fix it so much that it breaks.
With Pages, I think Apple tried to design a modern, reasonably powerful but simple to use word processor that most Mac users would find adequate to their needs. Despite its shortcomings, I find that it has a much more comfortable working environment than Word.
I'm afraid that I can't help but take the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" attitude as meaning "I like using MS Word. Why isn't Pages like MS Word?" If Apple had done that, it would not merely have been a flawed application--as Pages is--but a pointless one.
Originally posted by dylanw23
With Pages, I think Apple tried to design a modern, reasonably powerful but simple to use word processor that most Mac users would find adequate to their needs. Despite its shortcomings, I find that it has a much more comfortable working environment than Word.
Pages strikes me as a lost tool, it resembles a word processor like MS word, but it tries so damn hard to be a page layout tool ala pagemaker(imagine a lighter 'elements' version).
Both of these apps have their places, and yes, a page layout app for consumor is sorely needed, but it is not a word processor.
Now I have used Keynote this week to make a presentation and I much preder it to PP but PP is what EVERYONE uses and I cant risk incompatability