AppleWorks 7

jaredbkt

Registered
Has anyone heard any info about AppleWorks 7? I'm wondering if and when it will be released, what features, a better UI? (hopefully), etc. Thanks.

Jared
 
No kidding. A better OS X UI, and support for dang long filenames already!
 
Yeah, I really want Apple to release AppleWorks 7. I need a really good alternative to Word X. And SimX, I've been thinking that exact same thing since I got OS X: It's great to finally have long file name support in the Finder, but what the hell's the point when no other app supports it?! Not even Word supports it, and it's Cocoa (or at least I think it is). I don't think OmniWeb supports it either.

If AppleWorks had long file name support, a reliable AutoSave, and a better interface, I would switch from Word in a second. Some variation of Word's AutoText would be nice too. And what ever happened to macros. It just disappeared from AppleWorks when it came to OS X.

I'm kind of annoyed at Apple: they seem to be completely ignoring AppleWorks. There haven't been any new updates since 6.2, which was at least a year ago.

I think Apple might release AppleWorks 7 with 10.2, hopefully with a completely overhauled interface (the old one is getting really old). :)

Adam
 
Originally posted by ABassCube
Not even Word supports it, and it's Cocoa (or at least I think it is). I don't think OmniWeb supports it either.

Office and Word v.X are actually Carbon apps, even though they can't be ran under OS 9... I don't know why.

-B
 
Originally posted by phatsharpie


Office and Word v.X are actually Carbon apps, even though they can't be ran under OS 9... I don't know why.

-B

A fair number of Carbon apps (e.g. iTunes, Fizzilla-MachO) are what are called Mach-O executables, meaning that, though they use the Carbon interface libraries, they are Unix applications on the back end (rather than being CFM applications which wil run on OS 9.) Developers do this strictly for performance reasons.
 
So Word is carbon. Based on this info, one would think that AppleWorks and Word don't support long file names because they're carbon, and you'd think that any Cocoa app would support them, but OmniWeb doesn't. Actually, OmniWeb does something weird: If you save a web page, there's no limit on how long the file name can be, but if it's too long, it comes up with text actually overlapping each other in the download manager, and it doesn't save.

So far, I don't think anything except the Finder supports long file names. Hopefully Apple will support long file names in Cocoa in 10.2.
 
If you want my not so humble opinion, I've assumed AppleWorks was dead since ClarisWorks 5. I believe this was an unwritten agreement between billg and his Steveness back in '97.
 
I like AppleWorks. It's not packed with useless features (especially that papilionaceous paper clip!). The interface got a little big in AppleWorks 6, but I sure hope that Apple is still working on AppleWorks 7, because I honestly like it better than word.

And yes, OmniWeb supports long file names. I think all Cocoa applications natively support them, while Carbon applications need to specifically add the feature.

Oh, and by the way, AppleWorks 6.2.2 was released on November 29th, 2001. So it's only been 4 months. :p
 
I've been emailing the engineers at Qdea regarding issues with their Beta, and now official release of Synchronize Pro X, which is my favorite syncing program. Anyway, they said (forgive me for trashing the email) something to the effect that they were waiting for Apple to open up the architecture for long file names in the dialog. Apparently it is a restriction that Apple purposely put in for whatever reason. Qdea is optimistic that it will change soon.

My personal opinion is that Apple purposely put the limitation in to smooth the transition for non-power users as well as the rest of us. When you think about it, there are plenty of good reasons to temporarily limit long file names in the save dialog. For example, if you work in a multi OS workgroup and you save, say an InDesign file with long file name links, they will all be broken in OS 9. Apple wants to make sure that people are ready for this. That's just my opinion, that may not be in fact why they did it, but it sounds good.
 
Originally posted by simX
Oh, and by the way, AppleWorks 6.2.2 was released on November 29th, 2001. So it's only been 4 months. :p

I take that back. AppleWorks was last updated today. :D

AppleWorks 6.2.4 has been released. It's only a US version, and it STILL doesn't provide long filename support. :(
 
Today's AppleWorks update provides better support for saving and opening MS Office documents. Worth the upgrade on OS 9 and OS X. At least we know that it's not dead at Apple, however they sure didn't go out of their way to make it a known update.

Maybe 7 is getting closer every update?
 
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