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Apple Making a Spreadsheet?
Raleel writes "It appears that apple has trademarked the word "Numbers". Speculation is that it is a new spreadsheet. It makes sense with Keynote, Pages, and Mail." That would sort of fill in the last major hole in their lineup.
From TFS:
Errant homonyms aside, this seems to make a lot of sense...after all, Apple is just a spreadsheet shy of an office suite...although between M$ Office and Open Office, I find myself wondering why they're even bothering...
Also, wasn't there an Apple spreadsheet program previously...called 'grid' or something? I seem to recall something along those lines...perhaps 'Numbers' isn't a spreadsheet after all. The assumption that 'Numbers' is in fact a spreadsheet is only speculation, after all.
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
You know what I hate? Watching one company copy another's program without looking at any other examples for good ideas. This seems to be happening MORE these days, notably in the free software world.
So what WOULD make a good spreadsheet? Here's some ideas...
1) start with Lotus Improv - the key idea here is the separation of sheets, temporary work, and formulas
2) add 3D sheets from Stories, they would fit into Improv's "sheetlette" idea perfectly
3) there's got to be an idea or two from Spreadsheet 2000 worth using
4) Now make every *&%&^% part of it AppleScriptable
THAT is the spreadsheet you want.
Ya, i know of GroupCal, but I was never particularly happy with how it worked. I would like to see iCal work with exchange over webdav at least. Not to be a conspiracy theorist, but it's so blatantly missing that one has to wonder if there wasn't a hidden deal somewhere. I suppose if i were Mr. Jobs, I might just buy Snerdware.
-- Who is the bigger fool? The fool or the fool who follows him? --
It depends on your perceptive. I can agree that a lot of large firms (the type with full IT staffs and in-house programmers/pseudo-programmers) use the "real" MS Office in the manner you describe. But a lot of people just need a word processor to /read/write letters and a spreadsheet to crunch numbers.
Seriously, go drive/walk to you town/city center and look around. You'll probably see banks, maybe an accounting firm or small engineering firm that needs VB/Access functionally. But keep looking. You'll also see things like barber shops, a Ma & Pa convenience store, maybe a store front for plumber, graphic artist, and so on. These people probably wouldn't know what a database or scripting language was if you hit them over the head with one.
As long as they can read whatever Office formats that are sent to them (and thankfully that may actually happen), the combo of Pages/Keynote/Numbers will be enough for the great majority of small businesses.
Given the number of small businesses in the U.S., I think the potential market is higher than one might expect, especially if you think business=megacorp
You could sell TradeMark(tm) cookies
It reminds me: some grocery stores here (Canada) are selling "No Name" brand products (which are much like "President's Choice" and other home brands). And "No Name" is a registered trademark.
You are more than the sum of what you consume. Desire is not an occupation.
Hello? The company is Apple(TM).
People have been trademarking common words since trademarks were invented. It's nothing new and aside from completely made up words it's hard to avoid.
The more common the word in the industry it's used in the less protection your trademark gives you. A completely made up word (c.f. "Exxon") and you can claim infringement in almost any use by your competitors. "Apple" is just an arbitrary word in the industry it's in so it still gives them pretty good protection. Apple could certainly stop a competitor (but not an orchard) from being named "Apple Systems, Inc." "Numbers" is NOT arbitrary, it's descriptive so Apple would probably have to live with a company in a related field called "NumberSystems Inc." or a product called "Number Cruncher" even if a similar use of a more arbitrary trademark would have been a violation of their trademark.
Of all things on a Mac, that REALLY needs to be an option. It wasn't bad on all-in-one Macs with small screens, but on a 30" or dual-23s that universal, top-of-screen menu is all to often WAY OVER THERE...
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
Microsoft was caught with QuickTime CODE in Windows Media Player. Microsoft got it when they bought a company Apple was paying to write QuickTime plugins and had given the code to them to help do it. Where Apple got the Code to Microsoft Media player from I have no idea.
Incidentally this infringement lawsuit was the reason QuickTime 2.5 for Mac and Windows was released free.
You'll have to Google real hard for this as all the press-releases on it where removed from Apple's site when the Microsoft's investment where announced, but I assume some courthouse somewhere has documents on it.
So *you're* the Goatse guy!?
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Mac OS X--Unix without the assholes^Whassles.
I used to work on the Excel team (MacXL 1.5 thru XL2000). Way back when they were brainstorming for names, Doug Klunder, one of the original programmers on Excel made a passionate pitch to call it "Number Buddy".
Whatever publication you put out with Pages will put you WAAYYYY closer to something your Printer will smile over rather than curse, like with Publisher.
>shudder
I had the same reaction to Pages after using PageMaker & Publisher in a production environment. Publisher is NO GOOD AT ALL.
However, OpenOffice, Pages, Word & PageMaker/Quark/Publisher/InDesign/Frame cannot be fairly compared as equals.
Pages does Word + Publisher *BETTER*
Numbers will probably do Excel + Access *APPLEY*
Remember:
FileMaker, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Apple Computer, Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL).