Need some very basic info on i-macs

[Disneybumble]

I know stop getting excited but Mr B has decided he would like one:surrender:.But l am a first class computer thicko, SO
My question is excel,publisher and word. This is what my children use for school/college etc.
So what would they use instead, and say they saved it on a stick and the school didn't have Mac's . Are they then up a creek without a paddle
( wanted to say without an apple):tongue:

[Skywatcher]

You can run windows and hence Microsoft office on a mac:)

[josh.p.]

There is also office for mac :yes: It's fully compatible with Windows computers.

iWork is great too. Exports to .doc and .docx files :yes: Not sure how it handles excel files but I assume it will be ultra easy- Apple are concious of that :yes: They'd be stupid not to make it compatible with the BIGGEST office suite ever.

[Tink]

All will be well... :D :D

You are going to love the iMac!!! :9: :9: :9:

[catrancher]

As has been stated, Microsoft Office is available for the Mac.
I also have the iWork suite of applications from Apple.

The only problem I have is that after using iWork, I can't bring myself to use Office anymore. :mental:

And... I've never had a compatibility issue between the iWork applications and MS Office. :thumbsup:

Tom (:macwave:... well... we all know what side of the fence he's on, don't we! :whistle: )

[Keith]

The only problem I have is that after using iWork, I can't bring myself to use Office anymore. :mental:

And... I've never had a compatibility issue between the iWork applications and MS Office. :thumbsup:


I completely agree with this!

I know people will feel this is going too far :lol: but sometimes I look forward to firing up Pages to type a document. It almost makes work fun!

[josh.p.]

I do love iWork but I do feel that some of the settings and features are harder to find than in the windows version! It's probably because I'm so used to word- I've used it since I was 5! I much prefer iWork though, everything ends up looking great without any effort!

[Disneybumble]

Thank you all,that is great info. He looked at 1 in PC World and his friend has been raving on about them. So maybe next year:unsure: who knows. I am very reluctant to come out of my comfort zone.

[Keith]

I do love iWork but I do feel that some of the settings and features are harder to find than in the windows version! It's probably because I'm so used to word- I've used it since I was 5! I much prefer iWork though, everything ends up looking great without any effort!

Even on windows office 2007??????

There were three uber techy geeks in the office today crowded round a monitor trying to find out where they'd moved a certain function because of that new ribbon bar. I absolutely hate that thing and apparently they're going to make it common across all their windows apps

[josh.p.]

Oh no, I instantly downgraded once I got 2007. Awful, AWFUL stuff.

Somewhere between office 2000 and iwork would be ideal. But if I had to pick one it'd be iWork.

[Skywatcher]

Ah young josh you will never know of the horror that was wordperfect.

Do the files you make in iWork open in PowerPoint?

[Keith]

Ah young josh you will never know of the horror that was wordperfect.



and wordstar :) and gasp, multimate

[Skywatcher]

Shudder


Used to have to type in'code mode' as there was no wsiwyg Cant tellling youhow many times I typed my thesis. Ended up doing some on a typewiter!!!!

[Keith]

Well count yourself lucky! us tough comp.sci students had to type everything long hand in TeX or LaTeX

\documentclass[12pt]{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\title{\LaTeX}
\date{}
\begin{document}
\maketitle
\LaTeX{} is a document preparation system for the \TeX{}
typesetting program. It offers programmable desktop publishing
features and extensive facilities for automating most aspects of
typesetting and desktop publishing, including numbering and
cross-referencing, tables and figures, page layout, bibliographies,
and much more. \LaTeX{} was originally written in 1984 by Leslie
Lamport and has become the dominant method for using \TeX; few
people write in plain \TeX{} anymore. The current version is
\LaTeXe.

% This is a comment; it is not shown in the final output.
% The following shows a little of the typesetting power of LaTeX
\begin{align}
E &= mc^2 \\
m &= \frac{m_0}{\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}}}
\end{align}
\end{document}

[Tink]

OMG!!!! Hisssssssssss! WHO DARE speak of WORD PERFECT?????

Ugh. What a hateful, awful thing!!!! Right up there with Lotus! :eek: LOL.

[Skywatcher]

The number of times the thing just crashed and one time I lost 12 hours worth of work as saving it to the 'floppy' was hardly easy

then if I remember we had to save it as a secial spool file and go into the 'printer room' and put coinage into the printer and pray that the darned thing didn't stick or run out of ink.

Ah the good old days

I used to type a little like that in the wordperfect pane I'm sure Keith :unsure: - but so so often when you went to 'print preview' none of the bullet points lined up or you went over onto another sheet with your rudimentary table :mental:

[Disneybumble]

Oh l remember word perfect. My husband did his degree later in life. I remember having to buy a computer in 1996 that cost 2k and looked like we had a whole mainframe in our bedroom.
He typed up his dissertation and lost half of it .

[ukwdwnut]

oh the good old days of worperfect 5.1 for dos NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! :lol:

[catrancher]

Do the files you make in iWork open in PowerPoint?

Yep! :yes:

Back and forth... back and forth...

Excel = Numbers
Word = Pages
PowerPoint = Keynote

At least with Office 2003 they do. Don't know about Office 2007 files yet. Haven't tried those.

I'm too busy learning how to hate Office 2007 for my real job just yet. :mad:

Tom (:macwave:... I'll take the ones on the right please!)

[Keith]

works great with office 2007 files :yes:

[catrancher]

\documentclass[12pt]{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\title{\LaTeX}
\date{}
\begin{document}
\maketitle
\LaTeX{} is a document preparation system for the \TeX{}
typesetting program. It offers programmable desktop publishing
features and extensive facilities for automating most aspects of
typesetting and desktop publishing, including numbering and
cross-referencing, tables and figures, page layout, bibliographies,
and much more. \LaTeX{} was originally written in 1984 by Leslie
Lamport and has become the dominant method for using \TeX; few
people write in plain \TeX{} anymore. The current version is
\LaTeXe.

% This is a comment; it is not shown in the final output.
% The following shows a little of the typesetting power of LaTeX
\begin{align}
E &= mc^2 \\
m &= \frac{m_0}{\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}}}
\end{align}
\end{document}

:ROFL:

And... for Keith's benefit... (he'll get it)
Sung to the tune of "50 ways to leave your lover".

The problem is all inside your ed(1), she sed(1) to me,
But the answer is emacs if you like C-x C-c,
I'm here to help you if you're struggling to use free(),
There must be fifty ways to leave your editor.

She said, `I hope your print job doesn't get dequeued,
I hope that you've stocked up lots of vending machine food.
But I'll repeat myself - have you gone and colon-q'd?
There must be fifty ways to leave your editor.
Fifty ways to leave your editor.'

Just press control-K, Ray,
Try double-Z, Fred,
You're still in insert, Bert,
So hit control-C.
Press meta-x, Lex,
Then type, `exit-quit-leave'
Or else just suspend, friend,
and kill(1) it with glee.

She said, `It grieves me now to stty(1) sane,
I wish there was somthing I could do to see your prompt again,'
I said, "I appreciate that,' and started to complain
About the fifty ways.

She said, `Why don't we both just sleep(1) on it tonight?
I'm sure in the morning you'll be sick of reading Byte.'
And then she warned me not to be a power-cycling neophyte,
There must be fifty ways to leave your editor.
Fifty ways to leave your editor.

(Repeat chorus)


Tom (:macwave:... charter member... Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie appreciation society!)

[Keith]

Absolutely superb Tom :laugh:

Although reading it did remind me how much I miss Byte. I have a framed copy of their "unix is dead" issue still on the wall :)

[Tink]

Tom! Are you holding out on us???? Little did I know whe has a talented song writer in our midst!

[catrancher]

Tom! Are you holding out on us????

Absolutely not! I stole it fair and square! :mental:

Tom (:macwave:... you can tune a piano but you cant' tune a fish!)

[Tink]

Ohhhhh, you nipped it? :unsure: I'm a little lost (says all believing ol' Tink, who really things Tom shouldn't take advantage of her!!! :wink: ).

[josh.p.]

I'm afraid the most ancient 'computer' I've ever used was a commodore games system :yes: You loaded the games on floppy disks :thumbsup: :rotfl:

[Skywatcher]

You will never know the pain of trying to get a game to load by casette only for it to crash in the last 2 seconds. Then trying again at a slightly different volume

[Keith]

You will never know the pain of trying to get a game to load by casette only for it to crash in the last 2 seconds. Then trying again at a slightly different volume

watching the alternate stripy lines and listening to the tones and saying ooo thats a screen image, thats data, and ARGGHGH nooooo it's gone too narrow, it'll stop now :(

[Skywatcher]

I always wondered why 'ultimate play the game' wasted so much valuable load up time simply making a loading screen :lol:

closely followed by black wipe and 1982 Sinclair systems aaargh

[catrancher]

You will never know the pain of trying to get a game to load by casette only for it to crash in the last 2 seconds. Then trying again at a slightly different volume

Gawd.. don't remind me!


I'm afraid the most ancient 'computer' I've ever used was a commodore games system :yes: You loaded the games on floppy disks :thumbsup: :rotfl:

Hmmm... Josh. You child, you! :taunt:

Just to make me feel REALLY old, this is a picture of the first stored program computer I ever worked on. The IBM 1401. The box in the center is the CPU and contained a whopping 4K of memory. The box itself is about 5ft tall. The gadget on the right is the line printer. On the left we have the card reader/punch.

What fun! :thumbsup:


http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/cb/BRL61-IBM_1401.jpg

Tom (:macwave:... the ancient one!)

[Skywatcher]

My dad took me to see the computer at the ford factory he worked at all his life it filled almost a cathedral sized space and ran off punched hol readers. I remember the glee the chap who ran it took in prounouncing it's power :lol: and now when my compuer comes it will have a 1tb drive. At the time a mb would have been science fiction

[Skywatcher]

watching the alternate stripy lines and listening to the tones and saying ooo thats a screen image, thats data, and ARGGHGH nooooo it's gone too narrow, it'll stop now :(

Dur......dit. Dur.. Diddledidddledidddlediddlechzzzzzt

[Keith]

Dur......dit. Dur.. Diddledidddledidddlediddlechzzzzzt

Start of loading process ARHGHGHGHGH GNOOONNONONONONOON make it stop

[josh.p.]

sgq6j4YmHAk