Developer(s) Apple Inc. Type Word processor Website apple.com/mac/pages | Operating system License Proprietary | |
Stable release 6.0.5 (October 27, 2016; 4 months ago (2016-10-27)) [±] | ||
Pages is a word processor developed by Apple Inc. It is part of the iWork productivity suite and runs on the macOS and iOS operating systems. The first version of Pages was announced on January 11, 2005, and was released one month later. The most recent Macintosh version, Pages 5, was released on October 22, 2013. The previous version, version 4, was released on January 6, 2009, as a component of iWork '09. On January 27, 2010, Apple announced a new version of Pages for iPad with a touch interface. On May 31, 2011 Apple updated the iOS version of Pages to 1.4, bringing universal binaries allowing the app to be run on iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch devices. On October 12, 2011, Apple updated the iOS app to version 1.5, adding the iCloud "Documents in the Cloud" feature. iOS Pages was updated to version 1.6 on March 7, 2012 and will run on iOS 5.1 or later only. Pages for OS X was updated to version 4.3 on December 4, 2012, to support Pages 1.7 for iOS which was released on the same day. Pages for iOS 1.7.1 introduced better compatibility with Word and Pages for Mac, and v1.7.2 merely adding stability improvements and bugfixes was released on March 7, 2013. On October 23, 2013, Apple released a redesign with Pages 5.0, and made it free for anyone with an iOS device.
Contents
Pages is marketed by Apple as an easy-to-use application that allows users to quickly create documents on their devices. A number of Apple-designed templates comprising different themes (such as letters, résumés, posters, and outlines), are included with Pages. Many advanced features that were available in version 4.3, including mail merge, bookmarks, text box linking, advanced find/replace, alternating left-right margins (along with alternating left-right headers and footers), 2-up "page spread" viewing, non-contiguous text selection, and robust Applescript support were not included in version 5. Also, many of the templates available in version 4.3 have been removed in version 5, but some templates can be found on other locations. For instance, there's a free screenplay template for Apple Pages which has been compiled according to Final Draft's Cole & Haag standard. See external link below.
Features
Pages is both a word processor and a page layout application. In its latest incarnation (version 5), however, most advanced layout features have been removed. Over 140 Apple-designed templates were included in earlier versions. Only about 60 are included in the new, stripped down version 5. When Pages is first opened, users are presented with a Template Chooser which allows them to start with a blank document or with a predesigned template – including a basic, report, letter, resume, envelope, business card, flyers & posters, cards, miscellaneous, and a newsletter section of templates – that contains placeholder text and images which can be replaced by dragging and dropping photos from the Media Browser.
Each document window contains a toolbar, which gives one-click access to commonly used functions such as inserting objects (text boxes, shapes, tables, charts, and comments), uploading the document to iWork.com, and adding additional pages. In addition, the document window contains a contextual format bar that allows one-click formatting of text and adjustments to images. When text is selected, the format bar enables users to choose fonts, text size and color, adjust line spacing and alignment. When an image is selected, the format bar displays tools to adjust opacity, show and hide shadow and reflection effects, and mask the image. A separate Inspector window provides almost all formatting options available for any element in the open document.
Beginning in iWork '08, word processing and page layout are two distinct modes. In word processing mode, Pages supports headers and footers, footnotes, and outline and list creation. Users can collaborate with others on a document. Pages tracks changes by different users by displaying each person's edits in different colors. Users can also add comments alongside the document. In page layout mode, users have complete control over the position of objects on the page. Images and text can be placed anywhere on the canvas.
The Media Browser provides quick access to media of iTunes, iMovie and Photos. Users can drag and drop music, movies, and photos directly into Pages documents from the Media Browser window.
Pages used to feature a number of other advanced writing tools. Many of these have been stripped out of the current version. The "Full Screen" mode (introduced in Mac OS X Lion) hides the menubar and toolbars, allowing users to focus on a single document without being distracted by other windows on the screen. Earlier versions featured mail merge, which automatically populated custom fields with contact data from Address Book or from Numbers to create personalized documents. For example, if a user wanted to send one letter to three different people, mail merge allowed him to create a single document with placeholder fields that were populated when printing. The Mail Merge feature was completely removed in version 5. Tables and charts pasted from Numbers are automatically updated if the original spreadsheet is changed.
Compatibility
Pages can import some Microsoft Word documents (including Word 2007's Office Open XML format). Pages 4 and earlier could also import AppleWorks word processing documents and export documents to rich text, but those features have been removed. Pages 5 can still export to PDF, EPUB and Microsoft Word DOC formats.
Simple and complex mathematical equations can be written for a Pages document with macOS's Grapher, offering similar capabilities to Microsoft Equation Editor (plus 2D and 3D rendering tools only Grapher can use).
As of January 2015, Pages does not support OpenDocument file format. The only known software other than Pages which can open its files are the Google Docs Viewer, LibreOffice and Jumpshare. Google Docs can view the files, and save them as PDF via the Print function, but not edit them. Jumpshare can view the files.
While there is no program that can view or edit a .pages file using Windows or Linux, some content can be retrieved from a document created in Pages '09, because a .pages file is actually a bundle. A user can open a .pages file in an unpackaging program, or by renaming files as .zip files in Windows (XP and onwards), and will find either a .jpg or .pdf preview in its entirety for viewing and printing, though only possible if the creator of the .pages file elected to include a preview. The user will also find a .xml file with unformatted text. This process can also be used for users of the 2008 version of Pages to open documents saved in the 2009 version of Pages, which are not backwards compatible.
Pages can also export documents into a number of formats; formatting is generally retained during the export process.