Closer Look: Shiny, Er, Glossy New iMacs and Better-Than-Ever iLife and iWork '08
Posted 08/07/2007 at 2:08pm
| by Leslie Ayers
And, finally, there is just one more thing: an upgrade to iWork '08, which also got a new spreadsheet app called Numbers. Super-duper Excel nerds will no doubt scoff at Numbers, but for those who really just want essential spreadsheet features enhanced with consumer-friendly, good-looking graphical capabilities, Numbers will come a welcome alternative to the buttoned-down Excel. (Granted, super-duper Excel nerds have a right to scoff at Numbers, which doesn't support Excel macros, although it does support the .xls file format.) As you'd expect from the company that developed Keynote, Numbers' graphics and charting skills are focused on the quality of the graphics - breath of fresh air if you're used to the old-school look and feel of PowerPoint's charts and graphs.

Numbers lets you view (and print) multiple sheets on the same canvas. And you can add graphics too.
Keynote '08 introduces a feature called Smart Builds, which lets you create photo animations instantly. Imagine, for example, a 3D cube with photos on each side, or a "carousel" effect where your photos spin around and stop for a moment so viewers can see each one. A new A-to-B Animations feature lets you create professional-grade animations that allow clip art or photos to move on a slide. And an Instant Alpha feature lets you outline prominent elements in a photo - such as a car against a backdrop of a car lot, or a flower on a backdrop of greenery - to use it as a piece of clip art in a presentation.

Steve showed us this slide to illustrate A-to-B Animations, which lets you create movement on your slides without having to learn any animation skills.
And, finally, there's Pages '08, which is going to be easier to adopt for those who just need a high-quality word processor (rather than a page-layout-focused app). Capabilities you're used to in MS Word, like change tracking and contextual format bars, are now part of Pages, which is much more design-savvy than Word has ever been.
iWork '08 is not free with a Mac purchase - the package costs $79. But if you consider the price of MS Office, it's certainly qualifies as a bargain.