![]() ![]() However, it is designed for viewing of static documents rather than editing or data import, so you might want your documents in some other format. So now you've decided to download copies of your documents for safe keeping, the next question is "what format?" Of the ones offered, PDF is probably the most widely-supported, well-documented, and likely to still be readable in some manner long after you're dead. So if you keep your only copy of anything in an iCloud document, be sure to be attentive to your e-mail in case Apple sends a notice that they're eliminating iCloud in favor of the fantastic new iWhizBang, and you'd better move over your documents while you still can. When Apple transitioned from one service to the other, they didn't preserve all the old data only a few specific things like contacts, calendars, and e-mail got kept, while general file storage got dumped, with a period of a few months to download it if you really wanted to save it. If you don't believe this, try and get any files you may have stored in Mobile Me, the predecessor of iCloud. (Hey, you, get off of my cloud!) Clouds are, by their nature, fuzzy and insubstantial, whether they're the ones in the sky or the ones on the Internet. Now, the first thing you need to do in order to increase its chances of long-term preservation is to get a copy of it off of the cloud. but it happens to be currently stored on iCloud in an iWork document format. Like, once you finish revolutionizing (fill in name of field you specialize in), you'll be so world-renowned that scholars centuries from now will want to pore over all of your personal papers, and here's one of them. Let's say you've got a document that you feel may be of great historical interest in the distant future. You may not have access to older iWork versions if you use it on the "cloud", or if your downloaded "app" version got automatically upgraded, overwriting the old version, or if the old version was tied to particular hardware that's no longer available. A new iWork document probably won't open in older versions of the software, and old iWork documents might keep opening for several subsequent versions, but eventually have support for "archaic" formats dropped. Their file formats are prone to changing in an arbitrary and capricious manner between different versions of their software, and the ability to open files from other versions tends to be limited even within Apple software. (Reportedly, the 2014 versions save in a different single-file compressed format if saved on a Mac system, unless you reconfigure them to save in the traditional bundle format.)Īnybody interested in long-term access to iWork-format files should be concerned about Apple's cavalier attitude toward backward and forward comaptibility. Saved in other systems, or exported as e-mail attachments, they are ZIPped and have sometimes used the double extension as noted above (but in newer versions seem to be saved with a single iWork-specific extension without the zip suffix, even though they're still zipped). IWork files, when saved under Mac OS-X, are in a bundle format that is actually a directory/folder. key.zip in some versions when saved in a ZIP file. key extensions respectively, or double extensions. And then there is the native iWork format, used in slight variations for each of the three applications, and bearing. (Apparently earlier versions couldn't, as the Wikipedia article claims a lack of interoperability with Microsoft's programs.) They can also save as PDF, producing a static document that can be useful for viewing, but not so much for editing or import into other software. ![]() The app versions are paid, though apparently they come free with newly-purchased iOS devices since late 2013 they will sync automatically with iCloud to access cloud-stored documents.Ĭurrent versions of the iWork applications can load and save the corresponding Microsoft Office file types (using, apparently, the 2003 file versions): DOC (Word), XLS (Excel), and PPT (Powerpoint). The web-based cloud version can be run in a browser (Not all browsers are fully supported when you try it in Firefox, it says that it is an unsupported browser, but seems to work anyway, though it is possible some features aren't fully functional), and is free for iCloud users. As of 2014, Apple seems to have deprecated the "iWork" name, but they haven't introduced any other collective name for their office-suite applications, so people discussing and reviewing them still tend to call it by this name even if Apple isn't. It comprises Pages (word processing and desktop publishing), Numbers (spreadsheets), and Keynote (presentations). IWork is an Apple application suite available as apps for OS-X and iOS as well as in a cloud-based version on iCloud. ![]()
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