Student Trying to Decide B/W Office or iWork

[AnthroAndStargate]

I am getting ready to get a Mac (so EXCITED!!) hence my flood of posts/questions. Sorry if ya'll are annoyed with me.

I am a student who does a lot of writing in Word 2003. I probably end up writing 1-2 essays a week in it, 10-20 pages... so in essence word is my bread and butter. I use Outlook with HTTPS Exchange support as well because I have a WM Treo that syncs my e-mail and calandar but I am thinking I'll drop Exchange and just use IMAP and get a new phone instead of using the crappy Entourage client in OSX. (Unfortunately my school using HPC or whatever its called if your not on the campus network so I couldn't connect to exchange through Mail.app).

Anyways I am wondering - in your guys expert opinion what is better to buy Office 2008 or iWork? I can get Office 2008 for 144 dollars from this JourneyED site apparently....

Is Word 2008 better then Pages/iWork? Does iWork have .doc support that can read and write/sync just fine with Word produced .docs and .docx?

In your guys opinion what is better for work flow, writing, "feel" (as subjective as that is), etc.

Any advice or input would be, once again, GREATLY appreciated.

I'm excited to join the Mac community - everyone is so nice and helpful. (Not to say that the guys in PC Forum arent! )

 

[Parasitic]

iWork was like $40 at my university computer store, and I got Office 2004 through my department for free (catch is I can only do university-related work with that license of Office, so no personal or corporate stuff).

If you're thinking about getting Office 2008, Amazon has it for $129, no tax in most places.
Pages (in iWork) saves in Pages format by default, and you have to do an export to convert it to .doc format.

 

[AnthroAndStargate]

Originally posted by: Parasitic
iWork was like $40 at my university computer store, and I got Office 2004 through my department for free (catch is I can only do university-related work with that license of Office, so no personal or corporate stuff).

If you're thinking about getting Office 2008, Amazon has it for $129, no tax in most places.
Pages (in iWork) saves in Pages format by default, and you have to do an export to convert it to .doc format.

So I take it iWork isn't good for someone that has to do a lot of .doc exchange with other people?

It seems like every time I used Office 2004 or even Neo Office on friends' Macs it is "slow". What I mean from this is typing feels slugish compared to Office 2003 on XP....

It even feels sluggish compared to typing on OS X in a form field, search bar, etc.

Is this my imagination or something else?

 

[Tyranicus]

Office always feels sluggish in OS X, even Office 2008 which is Intel native. Pages is quite fast and easy to use. It works just like Word in most ways. It opens and edits .doc like a champ and it's quite easy to save as .doc. Just choose Export instead of Save from the file menu. It takes just as long to save as a .pages as it it does to save as a .doc. While were at it, Keynote and Numbers can open, edit and save as .ppt and .xls respectively as well.

 

[Megatomic]

Tyranicus, if I were to create a resume in Pages and export it into .doc format, would the person who opens the resume in MS Word see the exact same document that I created, or would there be formatting issues?

This is actually a make or break issue for me, being in the tech field mandates that I have to keep a good resume ready to go at ALL times. You never know when the next big opportunity is going to come along...

 

[AnthroAndStargate]

Originally posted by: Megatomic
Tyranicus, if I were to create a resume in Pages and export it into .doc format, would the person who opens the resume in MS Word see the exact same document that I created, or would there be formatting issues?

This is actually a make or break issue for me, being in the tech field mandates that I have to keep a good resume ready to go at ALL times. You never know when the next big opportunity is going to come along...

Yeah I'm curious to know this as well. Also I'd ask the same for PowerPoint and its iWork equiv.

Basically.. in all honesty for a person like MEgatomic or a student like myself - is using JUST iWork possible if we don't want any formating issues, font issues, etc? The price of iWork is a plus but if it has formatting problems then its an absolute no go. Interoperability is the most important thing.

Is there a way to set it so when yous ave it automatically saves a .doc? It seems like it would be annoying to have to export every time.

 

[Kmax82]

My suggestion to you is if you are distributing a resume, you save via PDF. I don't know why people distribute .doc files (UNLESS they need to be edited).

But to answer your question, I see the same formatting in Word, that I see in Pages when I export via .doc.

If you'd like to forward an example .doc to me via PM, I will be happy to test in both to make sure your specific needs would be met.

 

[Kmax82]

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Yeah I'm curious to know this as well. Also I'd ask the same for PowerPoint and its iWork equiv.

Basically.. in all honesty for a person like MEgatomic or a student like myself - is using JUST iWork possible if we don't want any formating issues, font issues, etc? The price of iWork is a plus but if it has formatting problems then its an absolute no go. Interoperability is the most important thing.

Is there a way to set it so when yous ave it automatically saves a .doc? It seems like it would be annoying to have to export every time.

Well, to answer your questions.

If you have to know if things will work ABSOLUTELY, then I would either invest in Office '08, or buy a license for Windows and run Office in a VM. Because you won't know for sure that everything will be compatible unless you run Office. It sucks, because I prefer iWork (speed wise) over Office 2008, but you just can't be sure 100% of the time.

There also isn't a way to default save to .doc in the menu system. There might be if you were to hack the program via Terminal, but there isn't a built in way of doing this.

 

[Megatomic]

Originally posted by: Kmax82
My suggestion to you is if you are distributing a resume, you save via PDF. I don't know why people distribute .doc files (UNLESS they need to be edited).

But to answer your question, I see the same formatting in Word, that I see in Pages when I export via .doc.

If you'd like to forward an example .doc to me via PM, I will be happy to test in both to make sure your specific needs would be met.

In my industry, if you don't send the resume in .doc format it gets tossed. That's just the way it is.

 

[AnthroAndStargate]

What makes office 08 sluggish? If you remove the PPC code with that program does it speed it up?

 

[Kaido]

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate
I am getting ready to get a Mac (so EXCITED!!) hence my flood of posts/questions. Sorry if ya'll are annoyed with me.

I am a student who does a lot of writing in Word 2003. I probably end up writing 1-2 essays a week in it, 10-20 pages... so in essence word is my bread and butter. I use Outlook with HTTPS Exchange support as well because I have a WM Treo that syncs my e-mail and calandar but I am thinking I'll drop Exchange and just use IMAP and get a new phone instead of using the crappy Entourage client in OSX. (Unfortunately my school using HPC or whatever its called if your not on the campus network so I couldn't connect to exchange through Mail.app).

Anyways I am wondering - in your guys expert opinion what is better to buy Office 2008 or iWork? I can get Office 2008 for 144 dollars from this JourneyED site apparently....

Is Word 2008 better then Pages/iWork? Does iWork have .doc support that can read and write/sync just fine with Word produced .docs and .docx?

In your guys opinion what is better for work flow, writing, "feel" (as subjective as that is), etc.

Any advice or input would be, once again, GREATLY appreciated.

I'm excited to join the Mac community - everyone is so nice and helpful. (Not to say that the guys in PC Forum arent! )

Honestly, if you use Office 2003 all the time, I would suggest getting Office 2008 for maximum compatibility. If you already have Office 2003, you can always pick up Crossover for Mac, Parallels, or VMware and just use it that way.

 

[Kmax82]

Originally posted by: Megatomic

In my industry, if you don't send the resume in .doc format it gets tossed. That's just the way it is.

I'm curious, what industry are you in? I can't believe why people would want a doc file over a PDF. But then again, I don't understand a lot of what people do.

 

[Kmax82]

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate
What makes office 08 sluggish? If you remove the PPC code with that program does it speed it up?

I'm not a dev, so I don't know specifically, but it just doesn't feel all that much faster than Office 2004, which is ridiculous, considering Adobe apps start faster than Office 2008.

I haven't removed any PPC code from my apps, though, so I can't comment on whether that would help, or not.

 

[Megatomic]

Originally posted by: Kmax82

Originally posted by: Megatomic

In my industry, if you don't send the resume in .doc format it gets tossed. That's just the way it is.

I'm curious, what industry are you in? I can't believe why people would want a doc file over a PDF. But then again, I don't understand a lot of what people do.

I'm an instrumentation and controls technician at a combined cycle gas turbine power plant. The power biz demands .doc resumes, always has.

 

[erikistired]

i have both and i use office (2004) for all school related things. my profs have been really strict about the document format, so i don't take chances. i like iwork 08 a lot, it's very intuitive to use, but i don't want to chance getting my paper tossed over a technicality.

i have a 2.33ghz macbook pro and office 2004 runs fine once it's open, but it takes a few seconds to get there (because it's running through rosetta). office 2008 shouldn't have the same problems, altho it's office, so it's not likely to be snappy.

i don't have office 2008 so i can't tell you if xslimmer speeds it up or not.

 

[randomlinh]

Originally posted by: Megatomic

Originally posted by: Kmax82

Originally posted by: Megatomic

In my industry, if you don't send the resume in .doc format it gets tossed. That's just the way it is.

I'm curious, what industry are you in? I can't believe why people would want a doc file over a PDF. But then again, I don't understand a lot of what people do.

I'm an instrumentation and controls technician at a combined cycle gas turbine power plant. The power biz demands .doc resumes, always has.

That is amazingly ridiculous. I'd be weary of what other policies they have in place... are they stuck in the stone ages?

But if that's where you're going, skip iWork, get office 2008.

 

[Megatomic]

It's not where I'm going, it's where I am. I've been in this (or a similar) role for a long time, too long actually. But the pay is good and the perks are perky. I do have a major change in the works, though. I'm planning on finishing a degree in nutrition with a minor in physiology (hoping to be a sports trainer).

 

[Parasitic]

Originally posted by: AnthroAndStargate

Originally posted by: Parasitic
iWork was like $40 at my university computer store, and I got Office 2004 through my department for free (catch is I can only do university-related work with that license of Office, so no personal or corporate stuff).

If you're thinking about getting Office 2008, Amazon has it for $129, no tax in most places.
Pages (in iWork) saves in Pages format by default, and you have to do an export to convert it to .doc format.

So I take it iWork isn't good for someone that has to do a lot of .doc exchange with other people?

It seems like every time I used Office 2004 or even Neo Office on friends' Macs it is "slow". What I mean from this is typing feels slugish compared to Office 2003 on XP....

It even feels sluggish compared to typing on OS X in a form field, search bar, etc.

Is this my imagination or something else?

I like Pages, but sometimes still can't get over its interface sometimes. I suppose that Office (2004 at least) isn't that much different or better, but being a relatively new switcher once a while I do prefer Office. Hopefully 2008 will be much better when I get my hands on it.

BTW Pages performs very well IMO.