Despite the lack of a spreadsheet application, Pages does have rudimentary support for charts - including a small spreadsheet-like tool that lets you input data for your charts.  The charts themselves look great and the default color schemes are worlds better than those produced in Excel, but if Apple expects iWork to succeed, they need a fully functional spreadsheet application out soon. 

As you can expect, Pages has the ability to import Microsoft Word documents, and so far, it's actually done a pretty impressive job of importing Word documents without any issues.  When I say that Pages supports importing of Microsoft Word documents, I mean just that. Even if you open a Word document with Pages, the application will simply import the document into a blank Pages document, instead of opening the Word document that you clicked on.

Much like Keynote, Pages can export to a variety of formats - PDF, Word Document, HTML, RTF and plain text.  Pages relies heavily on CSS for its HTML output, but it would be nice for Apple to include a simplified HTML export for people like me who just need something to produce clean, simple code without any need to preserve font styles.  To Apple's credit, Pages does an excellent job of making sure whatever it exports looks just like what you've typed in Pages. 

As a Microsoft Word competitor, Pages is unfortunately lacking in a number of areas - not because Word does things better, but because Word still has a number of features that weren't implemented in Pages 1.0.  There are no document tracking options in Pages to track changes by multiple authors to a document, there's no support for mail merge, no grammar check (which may be a blessing in disguise as I've personally never appreciated Word's grammar check), and as I mentioned before, no spreadsheet complement with which to interface.

The one thing that Pages does an extremely good job of is not thinking that it knows what you want to do.  Pages will not look at something that you're typing and suggest a different or better way of doing it. Personally, that's one of the biggest issues that I've had with Word since it started gaining in "intelligence".

As a publishing application, Pages does make creating flashy documents extremely easy.  Much like many of Apple's other applications, Pages accomplishes this simplicity by including a number of well designed templates that are quite modifiable. 


An example of a Pages template

Using Microsoft Word templates is taboo, since pretty much everyone has Word and can spot a Word template from a mile away (e.g. the resume templates), but one of the benefits of Pages is the templates that are unique enough that you do avoid that embarrassing problem.  Granted, if Pages catches on, the novelty and exclusivity will fade, but the one thing about Pages is that modifying, customizing and personalizing the templates is extremely easy.  Much like OS X, everything in Pages templates is drag-able, but unlike other applications, you can pretty much drag or resize anything without screwing up the pagination of your document or the layout of the template. 

Performance-wise, Pages does extremely well - it's just as fast and as snappy as you would expect an application to be.  The one exception seems to be when manipulating images in templates. Even on a G5, things aren't as smooth as they should be.  Hopefully, it's something that Apple will address in future updates to Pages. 

Right now, Pages has a great deal of potential, but it's not there quite yet as the clear (preferred) alternative to other applications.  Apple also seems to know this as they have built-in a comment submission system into Pages for suggestions and improvements directly to Apple. 

For what it does, it does very well, but it is the missing features and supplementary applications that hurt Pages the most.  It's an application to keep an eye on, but right now, Pages and the iWork suite just aren't at the same level of quality and superiority as the OS on which they run.

A First Look at Pages Final Words
Comments Locked

198 Comments

View All Comments

  • elvisizer - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    stylex, the mini uses regular pc2700 ddr ram. nothing special about it.
  • egilDOTnet - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    And one more thing - regarding Office compability - I thought that the Appleworks package still was included with the Mac mini?? Is this not so anymore, Anand, or did you just forget about that?
  • elvisizer - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    #16 and #12- yes, it's true that if you don't have those items already you'll have to spend money to buy them. So what? if you don't have them sitting around, then the mini isn't as good a deal for you. The point is, for the vast majority of people buying one, a mini will not end up costing $1000. it'll end up costing $499+ 1 memory upgrade.

    also, there's one error in the article- anand says that TextEdit can't open Word documents. that's not true. TextEdit has been able to open and edit Word documents since 10.3 came out.
  • egilDOTnet - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    Just wanted to chime in on one thing - exporting images from iPhoto - you know that you can just select images, and then drag them out on the desktop or wherever you want them to be copied??

    Good article!
  • bupkus - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    I'd like one just to take it for a ride. I wholely support the idea of SFF and this certainly takes the "S" seriously. As to using less energy, 85W is probably as good as it gets.
    This is the first I've heard of AMD's mini-itx which uses Windows CE. I wonder if that means it's much more vulnerable to malware than the "mini". Sure it costs more than something like the Biostar IDEQ 210V, but if the "mini" means less free tech support to relatives who just web surf, I'd recommend it.
  • miketheidiot - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    #30 most people are still very computer illiterate. They also don't buy them because of their compatability or upgradability. They buy on cost alone and name. Apple has a name (whether a good or bad name is a matter of opinion) and now they have the price. I see no reason why these won't sell.
  • bigpow - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    >2) Sure you get better graphics with the mini and a better optical drive, but you get more memory and a faster hard drive with the Dell.

    Oh yeah... riiiight!
    Better graphics because you're imagining the picture! Dell comes with 15" LCD, Mac comes with your imagination.

    Nice comparison, duh!
  • Jeff7181 - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    I still think these titles that suggest the MiniMac will steal marketshare from the PC is rediculous. People don't use PC's because they're they come in the smallest form factors. They use them because of their compatability, upgradability, and cost. Apple has only scratched the cost issue with the MiniMac... but most PC users will avoid a Mac simply so they don't want to learn to use a computer all over again... for some people that's not an easy thing to do.
  • ehanneken - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    Stylex, Crucial's Mac page is http://www.crucial.com/mac/index.asp

    You would actually pay more to buy a 512 MB DIMM from Crucial than you would to upgrade the Mac Mini to 512 MB when you purchase it. On the other hand, you would end up with two DIMMs instead of one.

  • jasonsRX7 - Tuesday, January 25, 2005 - link

    #23 - Nail on the head :)

    #25 - Apples prices to add ram to the mini are reasonable. $75 to upgrade to 512mb, less if you're a student.

Log in

Don't have an account? Sign up now