Pages for PC and Mac

Software Reviews and Criticism

• By Ana Claudia Cunha

  I like it

  I was having problems with Word, as it kept crashing, slowing my Windows down, and was just not working for me, so I decided to give Pages another try. It does take some time to figure out how everything works if you’ve used word ever since computers were a thing. I do have to say it seems a bit less practical than Word for certain things, but for other, I have found myself being more practical. Since it does take a couple of days to get used to it, it might seem like it doesn’t compare to Word in the beginning, which is why I gave up on it a couple of times. It was when word crashed and didn’t save my extensive nursing school notes that I finally gave up on it. Pages has worked well, it looks simple, it does everything Word does (that i ever used), it takes up less storage space on my Windows, and it hasn’t slowed my Windows down or crashed yet. So I give it my approval :D I officially took the next step and have deleted office from my computer ✊ There is one thing I wish it would do that it doesn’t (or maybe it does and I havent figured it out): I wish I could add preset bullets and lists so that they would be available in future documents without having to save templates. Same goes for Styles. I look forward to seeing future updates as I’ve been reading reviews and people seem to have the same complaints: that the earlier version was better. If I already like it now, I can’t imagine what it was like before. Would be nice to see this super practical app of the past resurface.

  
  
• By Anicknamethatsnotused

  Linked Text boxes need improvement

  I have hung on to Pages 09 for two reasons, both of which are still better than the current pages. First, it allows higlighting multiple portions of text or numbers at a time and then editing them all at once (for example, if I want to make all the numerical references in a body of text superscript, I can simply highlight all of the numbers and with one click, edit them all at the same time). The current “upgrade” of pages still requires the user to edit each number or portion of text one by one, even if you wish to do the same thing for each portion of text. Not efficient at all, and very laborious. Second, if you are going to permit linking text boxes, PLEASE give the freedom to move around the text boxes to wherever we want! What is the point of linking them if Pages forces each box to stay on the page instead of moving with text wherever we want? Then it just automatically switches the order of the linked boxes and makes me want to tear my hair out! I will need to keep installing Pages 09 for these two reasons until Pages allows these functions. I realize they are more challenging because ipads and phones have limitations that a laptop doesn’t have, but please address!

  
  
• By JohnH8203

  PLease create a reference tab for citations

  I am wrtiting this review hoping the developers will see it and make approproate changes to this otherwise wonderful application. I left the Microsoft world many years ago after using iWorks suite and getting used to it's simplicity. The work flow was just faster and more intuitive than MS Word could ever hope to be. Just recently, I was tasked with creating a training manual for a medical facility. I had all the materials I needed however, when it came to citing my research, Pages showed a fatal flaw. I could not get an MLA style in-text citation. I noticed in MS Word, there is a reference tab and you can choose the style of citation. The program will remember and recall it for you. It also places it in a bibliography for you. In any University paper, they will ask for in-text citations. Footnotes, are no longer acceptable as the only form of reference to research materials. Please make reference tab with different styled citation ability, MLA, APA, Chicago, etc.

  
  
• By pjh139

  was 5 star right up until 8.1

  I need to note, I’m an author. This is the equlivent of someone coming in and destroying something at your work for 3 days and now you aren’t going to get paid for those and have to redo. That’s why like Crowley, “I’m having a moment here." I just lost 4 hours work because the new install locked up and ate the later file. Somehow it’s now the file I started working on at 12 noon instead of the file I saved at 2 pm, 4 pm. I went to save before the new OS upgrade and it locked up spinning uselessly. I couldn’t even open force quit to get out of it. It locked up the entire computer. I couldn’t even restart the computer. I did have app store open and I told it to restart and install from there. And now when I went to open it at 5 pm after upgrading my OS, it’s back to the 12 noon file. All that work is GONE. I’m livid. DO NOT INSTALL THIS UPGRADE. It’s buggy as hell. Pages continues to lock up. I lost the entire day this time. When I used revert, it told me that I had saved yesterday at 9 pm. It didn’t count the saves I personally did today at 11 a.m, 1:30 pm, 5:30 p.m. and at 12 a.m. Instead it wiped all that work out with NO copies to revert to for today. An entire day this time. Again the LAST update is buggy. DO NOT UPDATE. I’m moving back to Libre Office at this point, I’m tired of losing days worth of work. Label this as DNU

  
  
• By GoodOldMonkey

  Easier to use than Word, but way less capable

  Pages is still my favorite word processor, mainly because of its clean, attractive interface. A lot of people — I'm thinking Windows fans — seem to go for a cluttered screen full of clashing colors and inscrutable icons, but the Word interface gets me so irritated I lose track of what I'm trying to write. Next to Google docs, Pages is the least distracting to use, and it can do most of what I want. But less than Pages '09, and waaaay less than MS Word — which can handle vertical right-to-left Chinese text, insert images in a mail merge, define multilingual styles, and a heap of other things that keep making me go back to it. Luckily, it's free if you go for an Office 365 account with 1 TB of cloud storage, which is a better buy than Microsoft will ever offer. But I never use Word for work I can do in Pages. All of the digital giants seem to pride themselves on giving you less and worse than they easily could, and Pages is no exception. If Open Office ever gets a decent interface, they'll get my business, but for now, Pages is the best step up from Google Docs for the user without special requirements.

  
  

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