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At this point, we may as well say "Apple will someday integrate a spreadsheet application into the iWork suite," as year after year it doesn't happen.......

First?

what's "preadsheet"?

What does he mean "Apple is hoping the performance of Charts will at least rival that of Excel" In speed? I've never been bothered by a spread sheet app being too slow or laggy. I wish quattro would stop crashing on me though. So does that mean it will be as stable as Excel, which I don't use often so I don't know how stable it is. Or does that mean have the features of Excel, when just a paragraph above it was saying that it wasn't meant to compete with Excel? Sorry if you think I'm being nitpicky but I don't like it when people write things that say nothing.

MDN word: earlier, as in If I hadn't stopped to write a stupid quote using the MDN word I could have posted this earlier.

entanglement:
What is the definition of 'typo'

" . . . Not true. I can do lots of fun things like spreadsheets and pie charts."

-PC

Apple owns FileMaker, so why not an 'Express' version of FileMaker?

I think 'preadsheet' is manure from a Pread!

Jay, I agree with you.
Excel has been stable in my hands... No complaints. Can't say the same about the open office counterpart.

This is just a rumor...

Can anybody remember an Apple-related rumor that came true lately?

Too Hot!

i know it's a typo but i t shouldn't be in the title.
MDN?

i hate think secret, they should change there name to 'think ill make something up'

>what's "preadsheet"?>

It's a spreadsheet for people who lisp. And which cruel person invented the word 'lisp' for those people who can't say it properly?

"Apple is not planning on positioning Charts as a competitor to Microsoft Excel". That's code for it will be just as good as Excel but Apple won't say that. They should just rename it -- itWorks!

RUMOR: ‘Numbers’ spreadsheet software coming to Apple iWork in ‘06

HUGE MISTAKE !!
What they really need is a spreadsheet.

..and MSN needs to use the spellcheck.

The next turf Apple needs to conquer will be the office...and the living room. They are very well positioned for the living room. iThink they will drop a bomb in that arena for Christmas. The office space is gonna be a long, tough mission.

I doubt this is an original thought by me, but this makes me wonder if Apple is slowly, slowly developing its own "iOffice" for Mac. Apple seems to be adding a major feature a year to iWork, without really pushing the power of M$ Office, for now.

Ofcourse, a cynic could say that these new "features" are designed to push repeat sales of iWork. But I can't help but think of the scientific experiment involving placing a frog in cold water and slowly warming it up. Before the frog is aware of what's going on, it begins to cook.

Keeping iWork semi-under the radar for a couple more years, wring another Office upgrade out of M$, then release a full Apple-developed office suite isn't out of the question.

They are missing the marketing boat on this. The spread sheet should be called "Excellent!"......

Add an excel compatible spreadsheet with animated Quicktime exportable pie charts, etc. using OpenGL and the Quartz engine, add some Omni-Graffle Omni-Outliner stuff, make it all iWeb compatible and easy to figure out and fun, and then offer it free with purchase of a new Mac along with iLife. This is the best way to slowly counter Office for Mac, add incentive to Windows purchasers who use Office occasionally, and hit directly another incentive against the cost of Office for Windows for small business IT folks who are slow to catch on, but yet are intrigued at making their job easier.

Excel has been stable in my hands... No complaints. Can't say the same about the open office counterpart.

Got that right. I just trashed NeoOffice.

Should Apple intro a viable Office alternative I will give it a strong review (for personal consumption). Especially if it is devoid of the 30% of features I never use.

Smaller is good.

I'm afraid I must call ... "bullshit" on this rumor. It's been the same for several years. "Numbers," "Charts?" The name changes but the rumor remains the same. I'll believe it when I see it at apple.com.

I don't understand what happened to AppleWorks. It already had a spreadsheet, word processor, drawing, paint and data base all integrated together very nicely. I still use it as my main home drawing program for vector and images. It just needs to be updated to this century. Why has Apple forsaken it?

Isn't it a little early in the year for the annual iWork spreadsheet rumors to start? Numbers, Charts, Cells--well, I guess the rumor has to be right eventually!

And, not to be too nitpicky about it, but isn't 2007 iWork's second anniversary--not third?

How many home users really use a spreadsheet?

In the day when text programs were poor at tables and basic calculations, people would use spreadsheets as if they were text programs. Many still hold onto this bad habit, even if the text doesn't need any calculating, but merely a few boxes and/or vertical alignment.

A spreadsheet for home users would be a very poor idea. "Pages" does basic tables, charts and graphics extremely well.

I agree that this is a regurgitated rumor, many years old.

Thank God!!! It's about freakin' time! I just hope that Apple leverages the underpinnings of FileMaker to make a really powerful database/spreadsheet program. Hopefully it's also very polished - it's been rumored for so long now, it should be.

There's only one way to succeed. Support both the XLS and ODF formats. This especially applies to Keynote and Pages. Otherwise, there are only two choices Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.

Pages may be cool, but what good is it if you don't have the ability to share your documents? Open formats are what Apple needs to increase its footprint in corporate America.

I. Can't. Wait!

This is so wonderful if true. I just wish they would release it before then, instead of pointlessly sitting on it for an extra 6 months.

I also hope that it is like Quantrix (which is to say, like Lotus Improv) in how it works. Perhaps there could be a checkbox in the user preferences to select either straight Excel-like, list-like behavior, or Quantrix-like "modeling" behavior as a checkbox for users who prefer that. They could make it default to the less-familiar modeling behavior, just to make extra-sure that Microsoft finds it unthreatening.

There should also be built-in user templates for weight control (à la the Hacker's Diet), blood pressure, and exercise tracking. Again, these will make it identifiably a home user's application. Also very useful--really, if it cares about its users and the state of the country Apple should be thinking about ways to incorporate anti-obesity-epidemic measures into everything they sell (as with the Nike+ promotion, or the iPod itself, which basically compels you to get up and walk outside).

Since computers, like TVs, induce complete physical immobility in people who use them.

Looking forward to its release

Bring back Improv!

I just wish Apple would get some courage here and take on MSOffice faster.

I get the fact that Apple and the Mac platform need Office to survive.

My problem is this: are they building, slowly, over the years, a killer to MSOffice? This is a good strategy.

Or are they simply doing a poor job replacing AppleWorks?

Keynote looks to be an example of the Office Killer, slowly getting better and is truly becoming a better pro app with the usability for students and casual home use.

Pages is the complete opposite. While in principle it is a brilliant re-think of the word process and page layout for the masses, it has enormous fundamental design issues and is as buggy as a roach motel. The export function (HTML, word, etc.) looks like it was never even tested.

I hope Apple sees the opportunity in front of it: people want to be creative at work too. We want an iLife for our professional life, especially those of use who like being creative or work in creative fields. (I am certain this is the target corporate market segment for Apple.)

But Apple needs to focus the products first and foremost. iWork should be shoot for being what Final Cut Express is to Final Cut Pro. It would not be a AppleWorks replacement.

What's all this talk of "years" of rumors about a spreadsheet in iWork? It hasn't even been out for two years yet! It's been just over a year and a half (January 2005).