Tag Archives: Numbers

It’s a content creation device

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“It’s a content creation device.”
Leo Laporte talking about the new iPad.

It’s amazing to me that only now after Apple releases iPhoto for iOS do people see the iPad as a content creation device. It’s as if fantastic creation apps such as Bamboo Paper, Keynote, Brushes, OmniGraffle, and Korg’s iElectribe haven’t been on the iPad until now. In fact, Apple released Pages, Numbers, and Keynote alongside the original iPad and are the sort of apps people generally think of when they talk about productivity apps.

The new iPad and iPhoto have apparently killed the perception by some people that the iPad is a content consumption device. People that have in the past appeared willfully ignorant of what makes the iPad so popular for so many different uses and the pundits and analysts that come up with convoluted terms like “media tablet” to discuss the iPad and clones of it. Welcome to the future.

Apple Numbers ’09

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Apple today released an improved version of Numbers along with the rest of the iWork ’09 office suite.

They’ve taken this opportunity to really enhance their support for calculations in the spreadsheet. Numbers ’09 now includes over 250 functions each with built-in help and support for visual placeholders for each variable of the formula – instead of the old A1:D12 format you may be used to from Excel. To assist with this, Numbers also has a Formula List view for all of the calculations in your spreadsheet. And you can search this list by formula, function, or cell reference.

Charts are another area that Apple focused on improving this year. They’ve put considerable work into improving the different ways you might want to chart your data. In addition, they’ve also added the ability to link your charts from Numbers to either Pages or Keynote. And, you can change the chart styles, textures, colors, and fonts in your Pages document or Keynote presentation and they’ll stay linked to the original data in Numbers.

You can try out Numbers by downloading the free iWork ’09 trial.

Apple Pages ’09

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Apple updated Pages during Macworld 2009 as part of an update to their iWork suite that also included updates to Keynote and Numbers.

The key new feature in Pages is the ability to write in a full screen mode that gets rid of all of the distractions of other windows. Even menu bars and tool bars are hidden until you need them. And full screen mode will also let you work with two pages side-by-side.

Also added is an outlining mode that allows you to drag & drop to rearrange your thoughts. Images and movies will appear in the outline either as thumbnails or actual size.

The ability to do mail merging with Numbers and Address Book was added. Also new is support for EndNote X2 and MathType for people with serious words that need processing.

There is a free 30-day trial of the iWork ’09 office suite.