Beginning to dislike Mac :(

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Because of software updates, I recently "upgraded" to Big Sur. Yes, we have older Macs, and this will be the last "upgrade" I'll be able to put on my machine.

So, Big Sur. NOT happy! My main complaint so far is that my iWorks 9 will not work with Big Sur. I HATE that, for some reason, Apple thinks they must make unnecessary changes to their products. I really liked the iWorks 9 suite. But, now...

WHAT the freaking HECK is up with NOT being able to make MY documents how I, I, I want them???

WHY are their blue dots after each word? WHY are there paragraph symbols after each paragraph?

WHY can I not have a single line between paragraphs?

Is there no way to override all this crap?

Yeah. I'm angry! I cannot find support for this, so if any of you (who are probably laughing your butts off at my rant) can direct me to a HELPFUL site where I can FIX these STUPID problems (yep, I'm on a rant), I would appreciate your help.

*sigh*
 

IWT


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@TanBrae

Anger & disappointment are understood. No one blames you for that.

But, if I may; iWorks was initially released in January 2005 and the latest version, iWorks 9, released in January 2009.


I would imagine that you researched iWorks 9 to see if it was compatible with Big Sur before you upgraded?? If you did, you would have found that it was not compatible. If you didn't, it's not Apple's fault. Things change with time.

On a more upbeat note: the successor to iWorks does a great job. So let's try and help you disentangle the difficulties you are having now. There's nearly always an answer.

Please take a moment to tell us in detail exactly what problems you are encountering and see if we can sort them out:)

Ian
 
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So, Big Sur. NOT happy! My main complaint so far is that my iWorks 9 will not work with Big Sur. I HATE that, for some reason, Apple thinks they must make unnecessary changes to their products. I really liked the iWorks 9 suite. But, now...

WHAT the freaking HECK is up with NOT being able to make MY documents how I, I, I want them???


Hi TanBrae,

I cannot really help you with most of your questions as I don't use those recent applications, but I didn't see any mention for your reason to upgrade or of anything or anyone forcing you to do so.

I also didn't like a lot about the OS upgrades so I just went back and kept using the one that best worked for my use, and currently that is Mac OS Mavericks 10.9.5, but I would have much preferred to stay with Snow Leopard 10.6.8 which to me was one of the best Mac OSs Apple ever released, but many things stopped working as the computer world updated and changed, not just Apple and its OS.

So I am just mentioning that maybe you have the chance to just stay with the OS and the applications you prefer to use that suits you better than the "new and improved" later software. Just a thought and a suggestion...

But I am sure that some members will help you with the problems that you currently have and provide a solution for you, assuming you are happy and content to stay using what you have.




- Patrick
=======
 
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WHAT the freaking HECK is up with NOT being able to make MY documents how I, I, I want them???

WHY are their blue dots after each word? WHY are there paragraph symbols after each paragraph?

WHY can I not have a single line between paragraphs?

Is there no way to override all this crap?
Who is the "they" that have "their blue dots" you don't like? What application are you referring to?

Once we know what you are talking about, we may be able to help you format things the way you want, and to hide whatever it is you don't want.

But until then, it's hard to tell you what to do.
 
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@TanBrae

Anger & disappointment are understood. No one blames you for that.

But, if I may; iWorks was initially released in January 2005 and the latest version, iWorks 9, released in January 2009.


I would imagine that you researched iWorks 9 to see if it was compatible with Big Sur before you upgraded?? If you did, you would have found that it was not compatible. If you didn't, it's not Apple's fault. Things change with time.

On a more upbeat note: the successor to iWorks does a great job. So let's try and help you disentangle the difficulties you are having now. There's nearly always an answer.

Please take a moment to tell us in detail exactly what problems you are encountering and see if we can sort them out:)

Ian
First, THANK you for understanding, and for your response.

I upgraded because I use Affinity products - Photo, Designer, and Publisher. They recently upgraded, which requires at least OS 12. So, I bit the bullet and upgraded my OS.

I knew Big Sur would not support iWorks 9, but I figured I could work around that. Holy CRAP! What a MESS!

So, what happens...

I copy and paste tips from a Facebook group. We will be opening a business soon, and that group is very supportive for the machine we will be using. Previously, I could paste the text and/or image into a Pages document, format it with no problems.

Now, I have to choose if I want a regular document or a word processing document. WTHECK??? WHY can't it just be a blinking document?

So, I got that figured out. I think. I'm still not exactly sure which I should use for just a regular document.

When I paste text, if it has multiple styles, such as bold, Italics, and more than one size, I cannot highlight that text and change it all in one fell swoop. I either have to change the stuff a piece at a time (say, anything that is bolded is a "piece"), or change it all to "Body" style, and I STILL have to change some things by the "piece". Color, size, etc.

Next, WHY are there blue dots between each word??? I have yet to figure out how to get rid of them, AND the stupid paragraph symbols after each paragraph??? What the frigging HECK??? SO distracting!

Generally, I don't usually have so many issues figuring things out, but this... this is VERY disappointing. WHY does Apple "fix" things that don't need to be fixed? There was nothing wrong with iWorks 9. I can't imagine the issues I'll have with Numbers, which is what I use for our bookkeeping. I guess I may have to go back to Windows, which I don't want to do, and husband is a FIRM Mac man - doesn't want a Windows machine in the house. But, I'm fed up. Apple isn't doing any great advances in my opinion.

Sorry for the rant. I need to get some things done, and fighting something that WAS so easy, but now is not, is extremely irritating.
 
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Hi TanBrae,

I cannot really help you with most of your questions as I don't use those recent applications, but I didn't see any mention for your reason to upgrade or of anything or anyone forcing you to do so.

I also didn't like a lot about the OS upgrades so I just went back and kept using the one that best worked for my use, and currently that is Mac OS Mavericks 10.9.5, but I would have much preferred to stay with Snow Leopard 10.6.8 which to me was one of the best Mac OSs Apple ever released, but many things stopped working as the computer world updated and changed, not just Apple and its OS.

So I am just mentioning that maybe you have the chance to just stay with the OS and the applications you prefer to use that suits you better than the "new and improved" later software. Just a thought and a suggestion...

But I am sure that some members will help you with the problems that you currently have and provide a solution for you, assuming you are happy and content to stay using what you have.




- Patrick
=======
I did say why I upgraded - because of upgrading some software that requires a newer OS. If I had my way, I'd have stayed with Mountain Lion, or, at the newest, High Sierra. But, new software has required new OS. :(
 
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Who is the "they" that have "their blue dots" you don't like? What application are you referring to?

Once we know what you are talking about, we may be able to help you format things the way you want, and to hide whatever it is you don't want.

But until then, it's hard to tell you what to do.
"They" - Apple.

"their blue dots" - Oops, should be there. The blue dots - there are blue dots between each word in Pages. The new "improved" version. There are also paragraph symbols after each paragraph.

UGH!
 
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OK, you are using Pages. A pretty old version of Pages, I would suspect, given that you are so far behind in versions of macOS, but we may be able to help. If you launch Pages, then click on where it says "Pages" in the upper left corner of the screen, on the top menu bar, then "About Pages" and let us know the version, maybe somebody here has that version and can tell you where to change the preferences to hide the dots which show spaces and paragraph symbols to show them as well. It's somewhere in Pages preferences, but I'm on a much newer version, so my menu items are different.

EDIT: Apple does have a user guide here: Pages User Guide for Mac but it may well be for the most recent version and not for your older one. Good to have the reference, though.

SECOND EDIT: In the most current version, those dots and symbols are called "invisibles" in the preferences, and you can set the opacity and color. If you set the opacity to 0, they disappear. They are intended to help in formatting and selection, so you know if you have any invisible controls in the selected materials.
 
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SECOND EDIT: In the most current version, those dots and symbols are called "invisibles" in the preferences, and you can set the opacity and color. If you set the opacity to 0, they disappear. They are intended to help in formatting and selection, so you know if you have any invisible controls in the selected materials.
Ah! WHERE, pray tell, did you find that info? I've been doing searches on blue dots in Pages v. 12.1, and have come up with nothing! Not my day. :( (Snowstorm, husband irritated because of snowstorm, septic pump went out, roads are not good, etc. NOT a good day! ;) )
 
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SECOND EDIT: In the most current version, those dots and symbols are called "invisibles" in the preferences, and you can set the opacity and color. If you set the opacity to 0, they disappear. They are intended to help in formatting and selection, so you know if you have any invisible controls in the selected materials.
Ah! So, where, pray tell, did you find that info? I've been doing searches on blue dots in Pages v. 12.1, and have found nothing!

Not having a good day, sorry.
 
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Ah! WHERE, pray tell, did you find that info? I've been doing searches on blue dots in Pages v. 12.1, and have come up with nothing! Not my day. :( (Snowstorm, husband irritated because of snowstorm, septic pump went out, roads are not good, etc. NOT a good day! ;) )
I spent two minutes looking at the preferences on my version of Pages. Then another couple of minutes at the User Guide I linked to. Sorry about the tough day. We do have 'em.
 
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I spent two minutes looking at the preferences on my version of Pages. Then another couple of minutes at the User Guide I linked to. Sorry about the tough day. We do have 'em.
Well, apparently I was on the wrong User Guide. I didn't see anything about the dots and symbols in what I was looking at.

THANK you for your patience, understanding, and help! I DO appreciate it.
 
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And, another thing...

Do you know if I can save those "invisibles" choices as preferences in MY template?
 
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I think when you set them in Preferences, they apply to all documents, but I have to admit I'm not sure, and as I said, I don't have a copy of Pages that old. Give it a try and see what you get.
 
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I upgraded because I use Affinity products - Photo, Designer, and Publisher. They recently upgraded, which requires at least OS 12. So, I bit the bullet and upgraded my OS.

I knew Big Sur would not support iWorks 9, but I figured I could work around that. Holy CRAP! What a MESS!

So... you made a choice to upgrade your Mac because the non-Apple software you choose to use required the upgrade, and somehow this is Apple's fault? Ok.....

I copy and paste tips from a Facebook group. We will be opening a business soon, and that group is very supportive for the machine we will be using. Previously, I could paste the text and/or image into a Pages document, format it with no problems.

Now, I have to choose if I want a regular document or a word processing document. WTHECK??? WHY can't it just be a blinking document?

Ok, I have the current version of Pages. When I open Pages, I get a list of document types to choose from: "Blank"; "Classic Resume"; Bold Type Envelope"; and so on. It's easy enough to clcik on "Blank". AFAIK, Pages has always worked liked this. I want to say MS Word does also.

So, I got that figured out. I think. I'm still not exactly sure which I should use for just a regular document.

Define "regular".

When I paste text, if it has multiple styles, such as bold, Italics, and more than one size, I cannot highlight that text and change it all in one fell swoop. I either have to change the stuff a piece at a time (say, anything that is bolded is a "piece"), or change it all to "Body" style, and I STILL have to change some things by the "piece". Color, size, etc.

Huh? Yes you can. If some items are bold and you want them all not bold, then highlight it all; click on B to make it all bold; then click the B again to make it all not bold. Same thing for other types of formatting. I mean, literally, this is how it has always worked in Pages and every other word processing app that I can recall.
 
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If you want to easily strip copied text of all formatting, then what you want to use is a plain text editor. TextMate is one I have on hand and it's free. Take formatted text; paste it into a new TextMate document; and formatting is gone. *poof*

EDIT: you can disregard this. "Paste and Match Style" is what you want to be using. See my next post.
 
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Well, apparently I was on the wrong User Guide. I didn't see anything about the dots and symbols in what I was looking at.

You still haven't told us which version of Pages you are using, so I can't point you to stuff just for the version that you are using. But there are a bunch of really nice free user guides and tutorials on how to learn to use Pages:

Pages YouTube tutorial

ScreenCast


From Apple
Pages For Mac User Guide (free)

Pages for Mac Starter Guide (free)
 
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I feel your pain, TanBrae, the last update I did I was not very happy with at the time as it was rather early in the release of Catalina and I suddenly had lots of little connectivity things that no longer existed until developers got them updated. But, eventually it all got up to speed and this older machine won't be updated to anything newer. I also did not do my homework and didn't realize Catalina uses the new Apple disk format so that creates problems when other OSes can't even see the data on that partition.
It sounds like you HAD to upgrade. I keep two partitions for MUST HAVE software that runs on an older OS, and I boot into that and just deal with not having internet or cloud services. Catalina is my connectivity OS while my no nonsense older OS for certain programs remains intact and ready when necessary. If you have enough disk space and don't have two boot partitions, you may want to consider it for this kind of scenario if it comes to that later on.
 
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I would have much preferred to stay with Snow Leopard 10.6.8 which to me was one of the best Mac OSs Apple ever released...
Amen to that. (y)
 

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