[OS X TeX] OT: Pages from iWork

[Bruno Voisin]

Since I initiated this thread a month ago, I think I should at least  
report on negative user experience since then. Here's a message I just  
posted to another list:

> Aside regarding iWork: it's really software that should have been  
> worked upon for significantly more time before being released, it does  
> suck. The French localization of Pages is especially buggy. Examples:  
> "row" for a table is translated as "rang" which means "rank", instead  
> of "rangée"; basic functions like displacement and insertion of rows  
> and columns by drag-and-drop aren't implemented apparently; resizing  
> rows or columns by hand doesn't allow specification, apparently, of  
> whether the adjacents rows or columns, or the whole table, follow  
> accordingly; when you look for "texte encadré" (which means "framed  
> text") in the help you are directed to the menu item Format > Police >  
> Cadre only to realize "cadre" is there an erroneous translation for  
> "outline" font, corresponding more or less to the French "relief"; and  
> many more of the same. Don't buy it right now! I can but agree with  
> the opinion at  
> <http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1804&ncid=738&e=6&u=/ 
> washpost/20050219/tc_washpost/a37119_2005feb19>.

Finally this application only calls more for an external equation  
editor less graphics-based than the current Equation Service or LaTeX  
Equation Editor: for them, the TeX code for an equation is lost when  
the equation is pasted inside the WYSIWYG application, and the notion  
of a baseline of the equation isn't preserved, preventing proper  
alignment of the equation with the surrounding text. This is all the  
more unfortunate since the existence of the OpenOffice.org macro  
OOoLaTeX <http://www.fyma.ucl.ac.be/wiki/~piroux/OOo+macro> seems to  
indicate such things are indeed possible (not that I have the faintest  
idea of how). With OOoLaTeX, the equations are imported as PNG  
pictures; with pdfTeX it should be possible to do even better, by  
creating PDF pictures. (This is no criticism of the existing editors, I  
wouldn't be able to do any of the work that has already been done. It's  
rather suggestions for possible improvement. I remember Maarten  
mentioned working along similar lines.)

Bruno Voisin


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