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What's Behind Apple's iWork?

businessweek.com — Microsoft's Office still dominates the market, but Apple's new software may signal a tectonic shift in the two behemoths' uneasy alliance.

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  • schestowitz, on 10/10/2007, -10/+51Apple iWork should have OpenDocument format support implemented ASAP. It cannot just ignore the international standards, which for some reason it does.
    • estvir, on 10/10/2007, -11/+24Maybe it's some big conspiracy from Apple how they're trying to topple the free world and enslave us all! Quick, post ridiculously long quotes with 40 accompanying links than go spam USENET groups, you've been so effective so far!

      I think you're on to something! Fight the power! I think this calls for a... ONLINE PETITION, YEAH!
    • harlowsmonkeys, on 10/10/2007, -8/+27Since there is no usable international standard yet, they went with a defacto standard that works.

      When either the working groups that are working on fixing the giant gaping holes in ODF finish, and their work is approved by ISO, or when OOXML goes through ISO, there will be a usable international standard.

      See, in the real world, a working defacto standard beats an incomplete official standard any day.
    • over9, on 10/10/2007, -21/+23Lol, I love how MS gets bashed for not implementing it, but apple apologists making excuses when apple does the same thing.
      • Balanced, on 10/10/2007, -5/+10To put it as succinctly as possible: MS Office is a de facto standard for several documents. iWork isn't.
        • Colca, on 10/10/2007, -3/+2I agree
        • over9, on 10/10/2007, -7/+4What does MS have anything to do with iWork not implementing the odf format. you are just another apple apologist trying to excuse apple's deficiencies by diverting attention to MS.
          • meatmcguffin, on 10/10/2007, -2/+4Are you a lawyer by any chance? If not, then i suggest a change of career
          • over9, on 10/10/2007, -2/+3I just finished my mathematics degree.
          • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2and yet you can't add knowledge and common sense together.

            Microsoft basically DID create the standard that most office suites use. .doc, .ppt, .xls, and so on. Apple's iWork, OpenOffice, ThinkFree Office, and most of the rest adhered to those formats because that's what people asked for in an office suite.

            Face it, if your office suite of choice can't write to those formats and keep most if not all of its formatting when opened by MS Office, then you won't be successful. Microsoft is now using xml. Did they do that to adhere to more open standards? No, since it isn't really xml as used by others, but a hybrid of that and something MS came up with. The question is; why did they do this? Was it to prevent inroads into MS Office territory by other suites now using their old standards?
          • over9, on 10/10/2007, -2/+3@macparrot: whatever the situation is with ms, it has NOTHING to do with Apple not implementing the odf in iWorks. Apple is SOLELY responsible for doing this. It has nothing to do with whatever MS is doing or has done in the past.
          • Balanced, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1essentially, iWork and OpenOffice are 'peers' in this. MS Office being higher in the hierarchy. If iWork should support OpenOffice, there's no reason OpenOffice shouldn't support iWork.
    • fkr3, on 10/10/2007, -12/+16Apple can do whatever they want. In case you haven't noticed they're all about locking people in to their platforms and their software.
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -12/+3Truth. Why the hell can't I download iTunes without the quicktime crapware.
        • Balanced, on 10/10/2007, -1/+12Because iTunes uses Quicktime for music playback.
        • over9, on 10/10/2007, -7/+2really? i remember when itunes first came out i had the option of downloading it without quicktime and it worked perfectly fine.
        • vandy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6itunes didn't play video at that time
        • NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5It also uses it for video playback. It's not like Apple released a Home iTunes package and an Ultimate iTunes package or something, they only manage one version at a time. Besides, QT seems to be a lot better at syncing video and audio when you click to a different time in the clip rather than watch the whole thing linearly.
    • macewan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+12That's the first thing I looked for in reading through the specs yesterday. Please Apple, don't ignore OpenOffice.org
    • blackjack75, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6Given how faster openoffice is on Windows/Linux than on my mac , I'd love to use iWork. I just don't mostly because I want to keep my files in an open format. I still can't get used to the idea of OOXML. Purely ideological though, I admit.
      • neondiet, on 10/10/2007, -2/+7
        --[ I want to keep my files in an open format ]--

        That's what "Save as PDF" is for from the OS X print dialogue. PDF support is native in OS X, and you can get free PDF viewers for any platform and likely always will.
    • GhostFreeman, on 10/10/2007, -3/+2Maybe, just maybe, this was something defined in the agreement between Apple and Microsoft.
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -5/+1And Apple sucks for accepting it.
        • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5wrong again. That must suck for your ego.
    • schoate09, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5.doc is used 90% of cases, I think that's the standard. I love how these OSS fanboys get together on a newsgroup, declare something that's used 10% of the time a standard, and bash everyone for not "adhering to the standard".
    • eyreka, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Actually there was a comment by someone, I don't have time to look it up, in the last couple days who actually tested this and said (s)he hadn't found any OpenOffice file that Pages couldn't open. Apple often does not bother listing all features but just because the web-site doesn't mention ODF doesn't mean support isn't there. They do mention OOXML because real people like to know their word processor is compatible with what is most commonly out there.
      • ill0gical, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1(S)he lies. You can't select .odt files in pages.
  • lordtyros, on 10/10/2007, -15/+45"So why does Apple bother with iWork? It must have more to do with something as simple as 'offering choice to our users.'"

    "You might also ask why Microsoft bothers building Office for the Mac? Because its profitable."

    Hear that guys? Big bad Microsoft Corp. just wants to make money. Unlike Apple, which has your best interests at heart. Idiotic article.
    • over9, on 10/10/2007, -15/+1Apple occupies such little market share that MS may as well drop Office for Mac.
      • zodieman, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4Only if it's unprofitable for them. They dropped Internet Exploder because they gave it away for free (can't make money for that) and because they had no returns on it they canned it (yes, because the Mac marketshare is smaller and it cost them too much to develop at the time and ostensibly there were better browsers).
        Office will be around as long as people continue to buy it, MS makes money on it or somebody pisses of an MS exec really badly. This gives Apple a chance to develop a usable alternative albeit with lesser features that 95% of people really need and gives all of us something to fall back onto in the event MS decides otherwise.

        My needs are basic to the point that Office is useless and too expensive (ah, the key to it all). iWork fits the bill perfectly for me so Office is coming off the drive as soon as I can test Word and Excel files to the point I'm happy compatibility is good.
      • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Right over9, because Microsoft just hates to make a profit. A good percentage of Mac users buy MS Office in one form or another. Why? Two reasons. One, compatibility for documents on Windows, and two (might get dugg down for this), it's not a bad suite of programs. MS Office, while bloated in many ways, does everything that most people would want in an office suite. I've got it on all my Macs and use it all the time.

        As someone said earlier, iWork is a hedge against the possibility that Microsoft might drop Office for the Mac. They would need something to replace it with and iWork is the steps they are taking to do so. Keynote however, has replaced PowerPoint for me. I feel it's a better product. Pages is a great word processor and not a bad layout tool, but it isn't there with Word yet. Jury is still out on Numbers vs Excel. iWork is not bad, but I'm not dropping Office yet.
    • randomgeek, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Oh come on, that's not what he's saying at all.

      He's saying that the Mac user base is large enough to justify Apple making a productivity suite just for them because, after all, Microsoft is turning a profit by offering Word to Mac users. If there weren't enough Word for Mac users Microsoft wouldn't bother to keep making it.

      Jesus man, it's called reading comprehension.
    • Ireland, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Always root for the underdog.
      • chris8535, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Hitler was a great underdog, and almost every terrible leader in history. Everyone is an underdog sometimes, it doesn't mean they are good for society.
  • K3ITHK, on 10/10/2007, -25/+7Pages is not comparable to MS Word. Pages sucks.
    • DOGPARTY, on 10/10/2007, -4/+8Bet your CV is written in word, and I bet lots of employers see it, notice the trademark ***** margrins and type metrics of a word document and throw it in the bin.
      • theone3, on 10/10/2007, -1/+11Bet the only reason you're even thinking about CVs is because you don't have a job. Bet the reason you don't have a job is because you think misaligned type matters more than experience, personality and action.
        • Colca, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Best answer in Digg.com EVER! Thumbs up Theone3
        • bitspace, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2Wake up and see the 21st century. Statistics show that the average person today is far less likely to hold the same job for his entire working life than just 30 years ago. Contract work is huge, and the most important tool in a contractor's toolbox is the CV. Having a CV that is appealing to the eye is crucial when a hiring manager has a stack of 250 CV's to go through for one position. The ones that look like ***** will be binned without consideration... which is why I choose to provide mine in PDF as the default format, MS Turd and HTML available on request.
      • bitspace, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4How I wish that were true. However, a huge majority of hiring managers and recruiters still specifically demand a Word doc.
        • zodieman, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4I guess they never heard of PDF then huh? I refuse to give anyone Word files when all they need is to READ something like a CV. As long as I don't protect the PDF they can scrape the text off just as easily. There's no excuse or valid reasoning for those demands.
        • over9, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1when you scrape the text off a pdf it loses all the formatting. I tried doing that with my pdf CV outputted from LaTeX and when i pasted in word it was messed up. I had to write it up from the scratch.
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I personally typeset my CV in LaTeX. The output so much better than word or any other WYSIWYG editors.
      • schoate09, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1Employers don't give a ***** where your letter was written. as long as the margins are decent, they care about the CONTENT.
    • SVPirate, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Pages doesn't suck, it's just a different take on the Word Processing idea. If your tiny brain is incapable of appreciating that some people just plain HATE the way Word (on Mac or Windows) works, then I guess you deserve to be stuck with Office.
  • blaze03, on 10/10/2007, -10/+23"Previously, iWork had contained only Pages ... and Keynote, a presentation program that is comparable to, but far better than PowerPoint. (Al Gore's infamous presentation that led to the film An Inconvenient Truth was created in Keynote, not PowerPoint, as many, including myself, have said.)"

    I find it interesting that the author would include something so trivial in the article to make Keynote sound more special than it really is, and even citing himself as someone who's mentioned it in the past as if anyone would care.
    • chris9902, on 10/10/2007, -4/+3yeah that line was weird. Like pages got the "Al Gore seal of approval" or something. Did they read that and expect people to think "ooo it was used in a movie... how exotic"
    • Ramble, on 10/10/2007, -4/+8I don't think this person has used Office 07. It's the best thing to happen to Office ever, so I somehow doubt that iWork is far better than that.
      • meatmcguffin, on 10/10/2007, -1/+13I take it you haven't used keynote. It kicks the crap out of powerpoint in every way possible.
      • aristotle0dude, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3I don't think you have used Office 07 either or you are a light user of previous versions. I find Office 07 extremely frustrating to use as I have to keep on hunting for features in the "ribbon interface". I want MSFT to bring back the menu.
    • slapjack, on 10/10/2007, -2/+9For what it's worth, Keynote IS much better than Powerpoint in almost every way. Use it for a day and you'll never want to go back to PPT again. Seeing as how PPT is responsible for people creating some of the most mind-numbing crap, it's always nice to have an application that actually helps enhance the credibility and smarts of the presenter.

      That said, it's still a little over the top with the Al Gore "testimonial"...and at the same time, when was the last time you saw a feature film that was almost entirely created in Powerpoint?
    • Elranzer, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3"Al Gore's infamous presentation that led to the film An Inconvenient Truth was created in Keynote, not PowerPoint"

      It's not like Gore is on the board of directors for Apple or anything...
  • tomis, on 10/10/2007, -5/+17Apple really needs to grow some balls and make an out-and-out actual competitor to Office. They're doing it slowly, in pieces, and trying to go about it in a way that doesn't step on Microsoft's toes.

    They need to either; dig in and do some serious work at making a complete Office competitor, buy the Microsoft MacBU outright, or buy a majority stake in it so they have some sway in Office's development.
    • over9, on 10/10/2007, -7/+15We all know what happens when Apple releases software for Windows. Look at Safari or iTunes.
      • Kazbaeden, on 10/10/2007, -2/+12Don't forget Quicktime.
        • SirG3, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7I think we're all trying to forget Quicktime for Windows...
      • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -0/+11Safari on Windows does suck from what I've heard. However millions of people (though apparently not those on digg) use iTunes and QuickTime on Windows systems everyday without any hassle.
    • LuTze, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2Except that the MacBU is highly profitable and there is no reason for MS to want to sell it off, especially to make a competing product. Well, I guess it won't be a competing product since MS Office will not be available any more. Also, it iskinda hard to be a majority stakeholder in a part of the company!
    • sicapitan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1They're not in the office ballgame yet. They need mail servers and infratructure. they going for the online office-home link. They're filling in the spaces, and it is very good.

      Think about their art tools. pro video pro audio, no pro imagining. They have the knowledge, talent, userbase. at least for an adobe type suite on mac only, adobe is pc. market share.
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -2/+1erm i have the adobe type suite for pc. how is it mac only?
    • octophobic, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1Can they make a comparable product that does not cost as much? That would be pretty nice.
  • RidgeWalker76, on 10/10/2007, -12/+12Apple has long been the underdog. Apple is competing with Microsoft, which sacrificed quality, in order to lower the cost and gain immediate market share. Despite all of that, Apple is showing that, in the long run, quality matters.

    It's one of the reasons I think Apple is comparable to Toyota. In the long run, there is more value in quality.
    • over9, on 10/10/2007, -16/+6except
      toyota = quality at a cheap price
      apple = Hyundai more expensive than toyota
      • RidgeWalker76, on 10/10/2007, -3/+2It took Toyota decades before the quality of their product was realized, similar to Apple.
        • fletch101, on 10/10/2007, -1/+0I knew their products were top notch way back in '82 when i started driving. Some of my friends just didn't get it and kept buying Fords despite their self destructing engines (escort etc). So yea it took a long time for those less informed hard heads to realize it, but some of us knew long ago.
      • awhiteflame, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1Actually, Apple is more like VW. Great in the beginning, lasted for a good amount of time, then a span of downtime, then a come-back.
      • schoate09, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2Toyota>Hyndai in price.
    • theone3, on 10/10/2007, -3/+9Microsoft didn't sacrifice quality to gain market share - you're not looking at the qualities that matter to 95% of the market. Market decisions are based on the needs of the consumer - 'quality' is a myth, there are only desirable qualities and undesirable qualities. What we refer to as 'quality' is a somewhat elitist term meaning that you pay more for a certain type of object in order to either gain more returns or sustained returns.
      • RidgeWalker76, on 10/10/2007, -4/+5MS most certainly did sacrifice quality to gain initial market share. Quick and Dirty Operating System illustrates that perfectly.
        • over9, on 10/10/2007, -5/+6you have no idea what you are talking about.
        • RidgeWalker76, on 10/10/2007, -3/+4And yet it's MS following Apples every move. OSX long predates Vista, and Vista still does not match OSX.
          • Elranzer, on 10/10/2007, -2/+3Except with OS X Leopard copying Vista's visual style. No wait... more likely Microsoft invented time travel and copied Leopard from the future.
        • over9, on 10/10/2007, -5/+5@RidgeWalker: 2 button mouse. Enough said.
          • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -4/+4Wrong again over9. Apple finally (FINALLY) realized that a one-button mouse along time ago. OS 8 and 9 both allowed for right-clicking well over ten years ago. Apple didn't include a mouse with their system to take advantage of it (God knows why), but any two or more ADB and now USB button mouse could use it without any tricks to the OS.

            Apparently it wasn't enough said.
          • over9, on 10/10/2007, -4/+1@macparrot: that was my whole point. why include right clicking in the OS when the mouse that came with the apple didn't have the second button. enough said.
    • NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I'm not sure the term Quality is so elitist. And it certainly doesn't have to do with price, nor is it a myth.

      Just look at some of the top freeware or open source apps. Adium on the Mac is brilliant, for instance. Firefox on all platforms, particularly the PC, is great (although it seems that the gap is closing, recently). I don't pay a cent to use these creations and many other creations, and yet I use them because they're better 'quality' (and in some cases, cheaper!). When people talk about quality, theone3, they are partially referring to the ratio of desirable qualities vs undesirable qualities, but they are also talking about the quality of implementation and how well the thing works as a whole.

      On the other hand, I agree that Microsoft didn't intentionally sacrifice quality to gain market share. They simply made Windows work on as many different pieces of hardware as they could and licensed appropriately. This isn't a bad thing, it's simply a different market strategy from Apple's strict hardware regulations.
    • robwilkens, on 10/10/2007, -3/+1If apple is competing with Microsoft why do they compare their numbers to Dell and Gateway which are just microsoft customers themselves.
      • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Because Apple is a hardware company that also makes an operating system.
  • over9, on 10/10/2007, -16/+5I'm sorry but I am not going to buy a whole set of extra expensive hardware just to use OSX and iWork. If they opened up the OS to all hardware I would use it in a heartbeat. Currently PC + windows/linux gives the best performance/price. What is Apple afraid of?
    • tobbe303, on 10/10/2007, -1/+10Well, if Apple is supposed to maintain an OS with built-in support and drivers for all kinds of hardware setups and weird devices instead of focusing on a set of known setups we'd get.. well, Windows.

      Contrary to some people's beliefs, using OS X is not a human right, it's the right of those who've bought a Mac.
    • RapeApe, on 10/10/2007, -5/+1Losing mad chunks of money. There would be little reason for most people to buy a Mac.
    • REBELinBLUE, on 10/10/2007, -1/+8When will people grasp this idea, Apple is a hardware company, Microsoft is a software company, OS X is a means to sell Macs.

      If they opened Mac OS X up to non Apple machines it will cost alot more to support and develop as they would have to support a magnitude of different hardware set-ups and exotic devices.
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -5/+1How is Apple a hardware company? Do they produce any hardware of their own? They use intel chips, they use ati cards. AFAIK they just put everything together. This can be done by anyone.
        • bitspace, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Apple sells computers. Apple sells hardware. That makes them a hardware company. As stated above and in a million other places, the software they sell/provide is to help sell their hardware.
        • meatmcguffin, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2Apple design the hardware down to the silicon level, they don't just shoehorn existing hardware into a case. For example, they co-designed custom silicon with Intel for the MacBook Pro.
        • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6WHAT! over9 wrong again! My head is spinning
      • zodieman, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2You missed an important part: Mac OS X. They developed the software to run on their hardware. If they didn't care about BOTH then would be like everyone else you mention. The fact that they continue to heavily develop Mac OS X (even 22 years later) means they really do like BOTH parts of the equation. In case you didn't know, Steve Jobs and his teams have been developing Mac OS X in various incarnations (NeXT Step, OpenStep) since 1985. Steve loves HIS software more than anything in this world and he loves to make computers so Apple's modus operandi should be perfectly obvious to anyone educated in computing history.

        Maybe a University should start a new discipline: Computing History. Anyone up for a PhD?
        • MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Certainly they care about both. One could not exist without the other. However, which one brings in the cash? iPods and Macs. As has been pointed out, Apple is a big company dedicated to making money like any other company. I don't kid myself that Apple is doing this for me.
  • GreatDrok, on 10/10/2007, -2/+16Interesting article. I think the main issue here is whether Office and iWork really compete with each other. In a way they do but the reality is that I have already bought copies of Office 2K for Windows and Office X for OS X and they are sufficiently compatible with other Office users that I don't need to buy the latest version. On the other hand, I have bought iWork 05, 06 and now 08 not because they are compatible with Office but because they work better. I use my copies of Office to ensure I can read files that are sent to me correctly or to check documents I am forced to send out in Office format. There is no sense in worrying about trying to use something compatible when you can use the real thing. However, for my own document creation I use iWork because it is much more efficient. I can put together a fabulous presentation in a fraction of the time it takes to do something which looks like hell using PowerPoint.

    I know people will say that the interface for Office 2007 is much better and I should give that or Office 2008 a chance. Well, the loss of macro support in Office 2008 kills it on the compatibility front and I really don't see any need for the ribbon. Office is basically an old fashioned way of doing things even with all the new spit and polish. iWork does things in a new and more powerful way while also being simple. Typical Apple really. A Mac is the perfect office workhorse now, Parallels, XP Pro, Office for Windows and all the great Mac software too (OmniGraffle is way better than Visio for instance) means I have a killer system that makes me more efficient and in the end that is what you want from a computer. As someone else said in a review of the new iMac the difference between Windows and OS X is that with OS X you forget about it being a Mac and just get on with your work whereas with Windows it keeps nagging at you and disturbing you. Yuck.
    • over9, on 10/10/2007, -9/+1You know you can run OSX x86 on PCs now as well.
    • ariez84, on 10/10/2007, -11/+4Windows Naggin me? Please, I own both OS X (laptop) and Windows (desktop) and when it comes down to it they are both Operating Systems. One is not the savior and the other not the devil like all you Macfags claim. One isnt more stable, and one doesnt automatically does the work for you. They are both ***** Operating systems, although I admit for the non computer savy people, OSX is the better way to go.
    • vfbr2001, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0I agree. However Apple has a way to go before this will happen. We considered swapping over once at work but at that time there was no spreadsheet and there was a huge fear about the amount of training new software would take and the costs in productivity in the change over period.
  • over9, on 10/10/2007, -9/+7The thing is Apple has such a bad record with software on Windows that most people sick of Windows won't even give a second thought for Apple since they think it will be just as bad on a Mac. I don't blame them. iTunes + Quicktime is the new RealPlayer and Safari is nowhere as good as IE7 let alone FF or Opera.
    • AWidgetIHaveNot, on 10/10/2007, -3/+3Agreed, iTunes on Windows isn't great. It's easy to use but buggy and the Safari Beta is fast but otherwise a joke compared to IE7 (shudder) and Firefox (Yippee). In fact my experience with iTunes is almost enough to put me off buying a Mac, but not quite. The simple fact is I have found more bugs in iTunes than any single piece of software I have ever used. Doesn't inspire faith. My next PC will be a Mac though because I am BORED BORED BORED of XP and I refuse to buy Vista. Can anyone tell me what systems Apple use for bug checking?
      • awhiteflame, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7They're much better on Mac. Go to an Apple Store and play around with one yourself.
      • JonLatane, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Well, everything runs beautifully on my Mac. And hey, before you go whining about free software from Apple sucking on Windows, consider that the several-hundred-dollar Office X is the WORST program on the Mac today. Neither company knows how to develop for the others' platform; why waste resources doing more than is necessary in that regard?

        PS: What bugs did you find in iTunes for Windows? I found it to be a memory hog, but it was always quite stable and sane in my experience.
    • NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2Those aren't bugs, they're features! :P
  • hotdamn, on 10/10/2007, -0/+13will iWork ever cause tetonic shifts? probably not.
    Do I like it and appreciate the GUI and ease of use? heck yes.
    Will I still use Office at work? Totally.
    • over9, on 10/10/2007, -9/+3I personally don't understand what the fuss about OSX GUI is all about. It still has the same windows and menus. The only difference I see is really polished icons.
      • hotdamn, on 10/10/2007, -2/+1It's about how easy it is to get to the stuff you want to do. And the polished icons. And shiny tables. It looks really nice, ok? ;)
  • shoovi, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2I think that Apple should do what google do... buy some nice company with it's product which has millions users and use synergy idea to gain more "users"
  • Jorlwind, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7The future of iWork and Office for Mac doesn't really matter to me. I've thrown my cards into ODF based applications, like NeoOffice/OpenOffice with X11.

    And iWork won't grow balls until Microsoft pulls Office For Mac.
    • AWidgetIHaveNot, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Microsoft won't pull office for Mac because they would find themselves in Court very quickly. If that were to happen Apple would poach the Mac BU and within 18 months have an office suite that spanks all over Office, especially if they get help from people like Omni and Google, as I am sure they would. So before the case has even been properly brought before the courts Microsoft would find themselves out Officed by Apple on both Windows and Mac. I would take a fully fledged Office app from Apple in a second over MS Office. I have no doubt it would make me a hell of a lot more productive and end the suffering that is MS Word, the POS.
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2Why would MS find themselves in court if they pull office for Mac? Am I missing something here? Why isn't Apple not in court for not providing OSX software for PCs.
        • hotdamn, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Because Office is the world standard for Documents, Spreadsheets and Presentations. Just like iTunes is pretty much the "world standard" for listening to mp3s and managing your iPod.
          Both are available on every platform. hinthint.

          (just like Safari is the world standarf of browsing. I wish. haha)
        • 35263526, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1hotdamn, that doesn't make all that much sense. Neither iTunes nor Office are on Linux and I don't see any lawsuits pending.
        • awhiteflame, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1Why isn't Apple not in court for not providing OSX software for PCs.

          Because it's not illegal to do so (or rather, to not do so)
        • over9, on 10/10/2007, -2/+1@hotdamn: you forget the 1st gen ipod was mac only, i don't remember them being brought to court over that.

          @awhileflame: that was more of a rhetorical question since the poster claims MS will find themselves in court if they pull out office on mac.
  • jm1234567890, on 10/10/2007, -10/+4Pages is just too far behind Word and Publisher...

    Keynote is nice

    Numbers needs work to be a real spreadsheet application
    • Balanced, on 10/10/2007, -0/+9Care to explore this in more detail? I'm curious as to what you feel the applications are missing.
    • jm1234567890, on 10/10/2007, -6/+2Pages

      * Pages has many templates/layouts, which look nice. However, there is little flexibility in editing the layouts. You are restricted to how you can change them.
      * There are no diagram tools.
      * No referencing tools
      * The whole application feels clumsy (but that could be because I'm used to Word)

      I still use parallels for Word on my Mac.

      -------

      Keynote
      * Nice layouts
      * New 08' features puts it almost on par with powerpoint
      * Still no mature diagram tools (But these aren't so important since you can draw diagrams elsewhere and paste them in to presentation)

      -------

      Numbers

      * I haven't played with this much, but it seems to be missing many important Excel functions
      * Missing macro tools
      * Not much more features than google documents... just better layout tools.
    • blackjack75, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4I don't use 1% of Excel or OpenOffice calc. I'd be glad to do these in iWork.
    • the6thReplicant, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1ditto

      Pages is one of the easiest designer apps around.
    • guzziguy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+399% of users don't use all of these "tools" for the most part. Referencing tools? You mean like Google?
    • Balanced, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I would assume he means specialized tools for handling references. I.E. bibliographies and such.
  • strat94, on 10/10/2007, -3/+3interesting article but perhaps one of the worst written ones I've seen. Was it just me or you have to re-read half of the sentences because of bad punctuation.
    • dsendecki, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7Oh, I just stepped in a steaming pile of irony.
  • gohoos, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6Apple is a behemoth? In mp3 sales, maybe, but not in the office space.
    • LordVoldemort, on 10/10/2007, -3/+6It's pretty ***** huge in academia.
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -5/+3It is? I have only seen a SINGLE macbook in my 4 years of university. And it was used by a professor to do some slideshows. Everything else like in the computer labs is absolutely dominated by PCs.
        • zodieman, on 10/10/2007, -2/+5You must not get out much then. Apple is positively seeing an incredible resurgence in Universities, Colleges, high-school etc... We've sold more MacBooks and Apple desktops in the last 3 years to students than in the last 20 years of doing business with Apple. Can't complain too much (other than the 3% profits). Oh, and Office is a big seller but we're getting a LOT of interest in iWork now that it has a spreadsheet.
        • over9, on 10/10/2007, -6/+3For every Mac sold there will be 100 PCs/Laptops sold. Please don't resort to personal insults. The comment below by Ramble shows I am not the only one to notice the fact that Macs are sparse.
          • meatmcguffin, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4If Apple are at 5%ish of the market, then one in twenty computers are macs. That's a much, much higher figure.
        • Altotus, on 10/10/2007, -2/+2I don't mean to nitpick, but where did you get the 100 PCs sold figure. I google for it and can't find a reference. The most recent figures I can find (2Q2007) show that for every Mac laptop sold, there were 6 PC laptops sold, and for every Mac desktop sold there were 11 PC desktops sold. Estaimtes of global market share (all systems out there, not jus sales this past quarter) go between 5% and 6%, which would mean 20 PCs to 1 Mac.

          Anyway, the point about academia is well taken. Albeit, I mostly deal with MIT and Harvard, but there's definitely an abundance of Macs there -- particularly at Harvard; the MIT folks have lots of PCs with Linux, as one might suspect. Our local school system is mostly Mac in the elementary schools (no kids in secondary school yet, so I can't comment on that).

          I work for a big biotech, and in research, Mac usage is about 10% and slowly increasing -- the biggest increase has been among Linux systems though (in particular, vendors are providing lots of Linux support now and when presented with a choice between Linux or Windows versions they always go for Linux). I know the labs I work with have allocated about $150,000 for PCs, all of them Linux, and a couple more have standardized on Mac. It's quite peculiar because the de facto standard for IT is still Windows, but researchers have considerable leverage in getting what they want. So, we have finance and sales are Windows-only, while research and development is a big mix (to be fair, there's a very strong bias towards UNIX-based platforms in life-science).
          • d41f, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0I agree, my bias is definitely towards LINUX. However, it is more for the versatility and security. Linux has gotten stronger and better press with every new release of windows and I'm sure will continue to do so as the years go on.
      • Ramble, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6Not in the UK here. Linux and MS dominate unis.
      • NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5Every computer lab in any college I've been to on the east coast has at least half its computers as Macs, except for the occasional PC only lab in libraries - but those are balanced out by the Mac only labs that dominate the computer science, physics, math, and bio labs.
    • schoate09, on 10/10/2007, -2/+1aac, not mp3
  • nitrojunky24, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1for world domination of course what else!
  • Radan, on 10/10/2007, -1/+12Well, Pages isn't really comparable to Word (though more with Pages 08). Pages is a typical iLife kind of application. It's made for the people who isn't running a big corporation of 10 000 people. It's made the average home user, students and smaller corporations, who doesn't need all the functions that Word has, but what they need is an inexpensive and easy but powerful application which can create gorgeous and professional looking documents without spending too much valuable time on it.
    Though, as I said, it doesn't fit everyone, it's not meant to, but personally I have completely stopped using Word, as it doesn't have any features that *I* need which isn't done better in Pages.

    I'm not saying Pages is perfect, but I believe it's far from as bad as many wants it to be.
    • zodieman, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7I have a feeling that at least 95% of the people use 5% of the features in Office (not including the bean-counters in businesses). So why can't Apple offer something that looks and works better and give them 100% of what 95% of what people need?
      Honestly, we're still only 90% of the way there because we really don't have a true Exchange server client on the Mac. Don't tell me about Entourage, that thing is a kludge. Come on, syncing mail through OWA instead of IMAP or MAPI??? A true travesty. Bring us a real MAPI client for crying out loud!
      • over9, on 10/10/2007, -3/+1If they want something other than Office, there is always NeoOffice or OpenOffice. I don't see why they would pay when they can get free software which is as good as it.
        • Vician, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Even though you're just trolling the hell out of this thread, I'll point out both OpenOffice and NeoOffice are horrible on the Mac. I like OS X and appreciate the certain amount of polish it offers, otherwise I'd use Windows or LInux. So, iWork's is a good choice for that. So in the end it's a personal choice and wether or not you understand that, well, I could give a *****.
    • bloomanchoo, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5I'm just curious... what can Word dot, that Pages can't? (not talking entourage, or exchange)
  • peestandingup, on 10/10/2007, -2/+4My prediction...Office '08 will be the LAST Office release for Mac.
    • NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Why? It's not like most of MS's groups make money. 98% of their profit comes from the Windows group and the Office group, and as near as I can tell most of their groups lose money. There's no reason to stop making it for Mac, when they can make money off of it and continue to dominate the Office Suite world. There's a reason why Office is installed on every work and lab machine I've ever used. Cutting off part of their market is a bad way to go about staying on top.
    • peestandingup, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Tell that to IE & WMP for Mac. Oh, right. You cant because they've been dead for years.
  • SoloMalee, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Whatever happens, Apple has about three and a half years left to make sure they have their iWork solution properly sorted and working with all competitors. I can't vouch for the quality of iWork as I never tried it, but at $79 dollars, it's a price I would be prepared to pay alongside free from Open Office. If Apple don't pull it off, then they'd better renegotiate that 5 year deal with Microsoft:

    http://www.tuaw.com/2006/01/10/microsoft-promises-5-years-of-office-development
  • llsethj, on 10/10/2007, -3/+0Office development could mean patches. I think that with Crossover Office/Office Live/Vmware-Parallels that Office 2008 will be the last for Mac
  • octophobic, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1The only reason I use Office on the Mac is for compatibility.
    Lately though I have been using google documents because I don't need to worry about emailing it to myself at work or bringing around a USB drive. Feature wise google documents is hardly competition but the convenience is pretty nice.
  • vandergl, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3I played with Numbers for about 20 minutes yesterday in the Apple store. Sadly, it doesn't compete with Excel in higher functionality. I'm a scientist who loves his 3 Apple computers and a Keynote user. In terms of graphing, and functions Numbers needs a lot of work. I'm patient, so I hope Apple will put some effort into this because the UI is beautiful. My gut tells me that Apple isn't really going after the high functionality Excel user though.
    • jonknee, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I don't think its goal was ever to compete with Excel in terms of higher functionality. Its goal is ease of use. For the casual user, not someone who lives and breathes spread sheets, Numbers makes much more sense.

      For example, the idea of a canvas is a lot less intimidating to users. Excel pops up on my 24" screen with a huge window full of 6 pages of tables (some only partly visible). Numbers opens up and if I choose a blank document it has one table, which is sized to the window and that itself doesn't take up my whole screen. I can easily adjust the size of the table by dragging the side--I never need to see cells I am not using. Not to mention having multiple tables on a sheet, that just makes sense. Numbers is an impressive 1.0 app, Excel could learn a lot.
  • SVPirate, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I don't think iWork is out ot replace Office on the Mac **yet**. It's currently more like an 'Office Lite' for people like me who use their Office apps for menial stuff like writing letters and the like, working out my (lack of) finances, and making presentations for his local computer user group. It thinks more like a home user than a professional, and works more that way around.
  • guzziguy, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2I think it's great that Apple came out with iWork, they need to fold in an option with File Maker and that's it the total package. As far as Macs in the major business's go it's the heats and minds of IT that you need to change and guess what, you've probably got a better chance changing the hearts and minds of the Terrorists. Until places like I.T. Tech and all the other computer training schools start teaching Macs along side of Windows it's not going to change. I don't know how many times I've heard from IT when I bring back repaired or new Macs to clients "OH - YOU HAVE THAT THING WITH YOU" " Oh THE TOY IS BACK" They don't understand ( and for the most part don't WANT TO UNDERSTAND ) that the Mac can work along side of the PCs without problems.

    As long as iWork can save and export to MS format, there is no reason that users in business couldn't use iWork. 99% of PC users never ever use all of the billions and billions of features in the over engineered Ms Office. Office is a nice product - Outlook works really well but so does Entourage but as usual MS has left out one little feature that would make it 100% compatible. hum....????

    I'd say look for MS to start changing internal file formats to make the iWork and other competitor products not work (AGAIN) ....so yeah the WAR never ended.
  • vandy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5At some point, journalists became shaky on how long Office would continue to live on the Mac. Then when Apple debuted Keynote and iWork they started ringing the bell, claiming this was the end of Office and that Microsoft would cut off all relations. The truth of the matter is that Microsoft, as a software company, only stands to benefit from continuing development on Office as it's quite the profit maker for them. I had read articles after their most recent earnings call and people mentioned how Windows and Office were the only two profit makers for Microsoft. On top of that, Office for Mac accounts for something like 20 percent of retail Office sales. Sure Office for Mac suffers from bugs, isn't as fast or have as many applications bundled with it as its Windows brother, but the MacBU has released constant updates as well as working to make sure the apps work under Rosetta on Intel chips and work with the new Office 2007 formats. Microsoft is a software company, and Apple provides a profitable system for them to sell their products for, Office will stick around.

    Apple likes having Microsoft develop for them. If people know they can open standard Office documents on a Mac, then that's one less obstacle for people to move away from Windows. At the same time Apple allows people to use Windows on the Mac with Boot Camp and openly supports Parallels and VMWare. But the real topic at hand is iWork and Apple's aim for marketing.

    iWork is not a replacement for Office for all users and it never will be. As Steve said during his introduction of Numbers, it's for the rest of us. Office features some very powerful applications with support from many third parties who develop plug-ins. It's full featured, but for some people it is simply too much. iWork is simplified because it is oriented at doing the much more basic functions of said programs. If I want to work on a spreadsheet for a budget, build a small database, make comparisons, Numbers is fast and will let me do my task easily. Excel tends to get in the way of simple, it wants to offer too much help. Pages does layout and word processing, and Keynote lets you build great presentations quickly if you have the right eye for design. These apps can't replace Office in a business. They won't be used for research analysis. iWork is targeted at that home user, small business and student. I really enjoy working in iWork, and it will replace Office for most of my uses. I still need Excel for various analytical projects but when I don't need to make use of all of Office's hidden features and just want to get my work done, iWork fits the bill.

    I can't stress how many papers and presentations I have created in iWork, headache free, and in the style and formatting that I want. iWork and Office have a bit of overlap, and maybe Office will suffer some sales, but the two suites are for different markets. If anything, maybe it will help Office re-focus on who really needs their product to just work the way they need it to outside of a business setting. From early screenshots, Office for Mac looks to be making movements in that direction, and that's good. It's all about progress through competiton and I'm glad to see it happening on the Mac.
  • darkfate, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I'm more curious in knowing *who* is behind Apple's iWork. Apple doesn't give enough credit to their engineers these days.
  • robwilkens, on 10/10/2007, -5/+3iDon'tKnow, iDon'tWork, so iDon'tCare
  • panicofficer, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I use Office X and iWork depending on what I need. I use Office X for Excel and Word but the program is frustratingly slow loading. I have no complaints about Keynote other than the fact that you can only access photos in iPhotos in the media drawer. I've been able to make some beautiful presentations on it... stuff I could never do in Powerpoint. Pages has a long way to go. Most of the interface is nice, but it lacks a lot of basic things that any word processing program should have. A decent word count would be nice. The info box just doesn't cut it. The styles drawer works nicely.
  • Altotus, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7iWork is not Office, and I don't think it's intended to be. The big problem for iWork really is consistency in the target audience.

    Keynote is a fantastic presentation app -- you have a slightly different set of drawing tools than PowerPoint, but otherwise the applciation itself is far better than PowerPoint for making presentations. More control, better effects, better presentation options, more formats, better rendering, etc. It's just excellent and is really best in breed for a hardcore business user.

    Then you have Pages. Pages is quite simple. It's not as feature complete as OpenOffice or Word -- for example, you can only merge from Address Book. However, at least in '08, it's page layout handling is much better than Word, and it does a far better job of making what you see on the screen appear that way in print. But there's a lack of dictionaries (think other languages), grammar checkers, equation editors, etc. Pages is approriate for middling work, and it'd be great for students (does footnotes, endnotes, and TOC ok, but for an index you need AppleScript) or people whipping up brochures, signs, etc. It's good, but anything more than basic use would require another product.

    Then there's Numbers. Numbers is a very simple spreadsheet application. No pivot-tables, graphing has some peculiarities (X-Y graphs in particular), etc. It can certainly make nicer graphics than Excel, and you have more options as to what goes in a cell (you can have columns of images or sounds, for example), but it lacks some basic things like error-bars on graphs, many statistical functions (no ANOVA, for example). No macros (not even in AppleScript). It's just not usable the way people have come to use spreadsheets in the business world. Numbers would be suitable for home use, perhaps to make inventories, budgets, little league rosters, price lists, etc.

    So, you've got one iron-clad presentation app, plus a good word-processor that's lacking a few features that users would expect to have, and then a spreadsheet which is far too limited to be acceptable in a business situation and probably at home.

    For $79, I think it's a good buy, but it simply won't replace office. For many people, iWork + OpenOffice (particularly whent the native port is complete) or NeoOffice will satisfy all their needs, but will do so using two different apps. The current Office for Mac is a little disappointing because it doesn't interact all that well with the platform, but it's very capable (with the possible exception of PowerPoint, which simply is not as good as Keynote). I don't think the two compete at all, I think they hit two very different demographics. However, I also think that Apple has considerable discontinuity between their apps on the level of functionality they each provide.
  • im3ngs, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1I just got my copy and am using it. It slows down my system. Keynote isn't as upgrade as I would have liked, although I absolutely LOVE the Instant Alpha feature. Animation is a bit clunky, but useable. Just tried Numbers... I have to say, it's Mac. ;-)
  • orlyfactor, on 10/10/2007, -4/+2What's behind it? Steve Jobs, reaming everyone who uses it, right in the balloon knot.
  • fragsta, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I think the simple answer to that question is that it's FUELLED BY THE SOULS OF THE DAMNED.
  • linktothepast, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4I got iWork because of Keynote. I have to say that I am pleased with it. And even though Pages isn't close to Word, I actually prefer it because it isn't as slow. That's probably because it is universal, but I digress.
  • d41f, on 10/10/2007, -2/+0this topic always makes me smile. How much longer before people get sick of all the BS and just use an open source OS?
    • Balanced, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Probably when an open source OS offers what they want... Without the need to configure, custom code, or deal with poorly-written documentation.

      Open Source is a neat idea, but don't think it's the only valid option.
  • lavo96, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2iWork is not really an Office competitor, but is a replacement for the once popular Appleworks. Pages fills the gap of not having Publisher on the Mac, and now its even better with the added Word Processing capabilities (writing a basic letter in page layout mode in Pages 06 was dreadful).

    I'm surprised no one has mentioned this yet :-)
  • dgrgich, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2To me - as a systems admin for 10 years running - it seems clear that as long as MS controls Outlook, they'll control the universe. I believe that Exchange is the key these days to Microsoft's domination of the business space. Entourage is such a piece of crap that I have several Mac users at my current employer (about 20% of the 45 Mac users we have) who use OWA for mail/calendaring instead.

    If Apple or someone else were able to write something that interfaced seamlessly with Exchange and had the quality of experience our Outlook users enjoyed, you'd see some real migration. Of course, to get this tight integration, you'd have to pay MS some sort of license, I imagine. This would inflate the cost quite a bit of the eventual client.
  • THEMACGOD, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Always have a Plan B.
  • chrisutley, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Maybe Apple realized that writing a decent word processor and spreadsheet is easy for a company with their resources, and maybe Apple is tired of their customers being treated like second class citizens when it comes to office suites.
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