Datasheet

8
Part I: Introducing iWork ’09
✓ Microsoft Office is a suite of applications that comes in a variety of
flavors: on Mac OS X, it normally includes Microsoft Office, Microsoft
Excel, and Microsoft PowerPoint. On Windows, there are further variations,
some of which include Microsoft Access (a database).
Here’s how iWork fits into the picture.
Official business
iWork is an office suite, like Microsoft Office. Office suites provide applications
that are, well, office oriented. An office suite usually includes at least
✓ A word processing application such as Microsoft Word or iWork’s Pages
✓ A spreadsheet application such as Microsoft Excel or iWork’s Numbers
✓ A presentation application such as Microsoft PowerPoint or iWork’s
Keynote
One of the coolest advantages of iWork is that major features, not just small
operations such as changing a font or selecting a color, are available in the
same way in all its applications. You really have only one program to learn
when you’re using iWork.
One piece at a time
A lot of technical trickery is in the background, but you use iWork through
three applications that are similar to Microsoft Office applications (but way
cooler, I think).
Pages
For many people, word processing is the core of an office suite. In fact, many
people don’t get beyond it. You can create two types of word processing
documents with iWork:
✓ Standard word processing documents, in which the text flows from
page to page as needed (for example, add a paragraph on page three,
and the bottom of page three flows onto the top of page four automati-
cally). In general, the automatic flowing of word processing documents
is used for documents that will be read in the way in which letters and
memos are read.