IWORK 09 RETAIL-INT

As a Vista-fugue, the main reasons for even bothering with a `Bootcamp' Windows installation were Microsoft "Office" and Intuit's "Quicken/Turbotax", both richer-featured in their PC than in their Mac releases. Disappointingly, iWork '08 'Pages' performed better as an image-based page layout package for the multimedia center crowd, proving woefully underpowered in a professional business office ... crippled by the tediously awkward conversion hassle from *.doc to *.pages documents.

No more! With iWork '09, Apple has virtually erased any remaining barrier to business office `switchers' still on the fence. I have explored and tested Pages '09 since its online release as a downloadable fully functional 30-day trial demo. I was so impressed with the new Pages (as against the flashy eye candy of the '08 version) that I ordered the full boxed version. [The trial software is well worth a test run to see if iWork meets your needs.) The new Pages now easily exports a document in doc, txt or pdf format, and does a remarkably lifelike transformation of even highly complex Word documents, tables, lists, or legal briefs with a mere double-click or drag-and drop.

Rather than spreading myself too thin, I limit this review to `Pages', leaving commentary on `Numbers' to spreadsheet buffs ... `Numbers' capabilities, in the past, were no match for the depth of MS-Excel. If `Numbers` performs as well as `Pages' in this iWork overhaul, then the product will be the best eighty bucks gift for your Mac. `Keynote', an image-with-outline presenter's tool, probably will prove at least the equal of MS-PowerPoint considering the Mac's flair for spectacular graphics.

`Pages' well may be the impressive turnaround software that elevates the Mac from multimedia center toy to serious professional business status. Highly recommended for Vista-weary PC users and Mac loyalists looking for a solid business suite. The detailed crystal-clear manuals and crisp `Help' replies are welcome value-added resources.

This is a nice if unspectacular upgrade. All three programs have been improved. It isn't the have-to-have change that iWork 08 was, but I'm happy with it. All three programs include more of Apple's slick templates, integrate with each other better and sport useful new features.

The biggest changes are in Numbers, which makes sense as it's the newest member of the suite. Apple claims 90 new functions. No longer being a power spreadsheet user I don't need all of them but the much improved charting is appreciated. Numbers also integrates with Pages for page merge, so you can use non-Address Book contact lists. That was an obvious omission in the previous version and is honestly useful. Also Numbers charts and tables inserted in Pages and Keynote will change if the spreadsheet is changed. Again an obvious omission in the last version that's been addressed. Don't move your files, though or you'll lose the links. As before, Numbers is an easy to use and attractive program for normal people. It isn't a replacement for Excel for power spreadsheet users. Thank goodness I don't have to do that kind of work any more.

Keynote has some stunning new transitions and effects that extend the sheer elegance of its presentations even farther beyond Powerpoint. If you do a lot of presentation work, Keynote is worth the price of the suite all by itself. And there are some new templates that reflect Apple's excellence in presentation.

Choosing templates in all three programs is now a bit easier with the improved template chooser.

Pages is the program that I use daily and it has a couple of new features that I appreciate. The full screen mode, that blacks out background distractions is welcome. That's been around in a number of programs before and I've gotten used to using it. The Pages implementation is a bit different, but done with Apple's typical elegance. The outlining feature introduced here is brilliantly implemented. It's the killer feature for me in the suite. I appreciate all the others but use this often.

There are some other new Pages features like the ability to work include formulas and integrate with Endnotes that I haven't used yet. This is a step in the right direction. Hopefully Apple will also include endnote compatibility Bookends, which I do use in an update. Pages still lacks some of the high end features of Word and probably always will. On the other hand it is more pleasant to work with and stable. Compatibility between Windows Office files and iWork seems to be as solid as it is between the Windows and Mac versions. Since Microsoft dropped macro support on the latest version of Office for Mac, I've switched totally to iWork and haven't looked back. This version of iWork just makes me happier with that decision.

Pages does have a very nice intuitive interface, as with most Apple products. And I suppose the main advantage of Pages is that you can do layout and word processing in one application. But for those interested more specifically in word processing - especially long documents, with many headers and subheaders, indexes, etc. - Pages is not yet optimal.

The main problem with Pages in my view is the lack of a "Document Map" feature. When working with long documents that have a lot of subheadings, Pages becomes clumsy to use. You have to work directly within the Outline view, collapsing and expanding sections. But this entails realigning the text, so you often end up navigating up and down through several pages to find the place where you had been working.

Another significant problem is that it does not export perfectly into Word. For example, when you save your Pages document as a Word file and then open it in Word, the Document Map feature in Word will not parse the document correctly. The result is that once you have converted a document to Pages format, it's pretty hard to convert it back into Word format.