iPhone can read Word, Excel, PDF documents
The title explains it all: Revealed in Apple's new iPhone Guided Tour video is the swanky handset's previously-unknown ability to read Word, Excel, and PDF document e-mail attachments. This alleviates fears to the contrary, and will sure be useful for those business-types On The Go eager for their quarterly profit reports and sweet pie charts and whatnot. But without actual editing capabilities, those business-y people still have something to complain about.Then again, does anybody actually edit Word/Excel documents on their BlackBerry? (Serious question.)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Jeffrey Bergier said 2:10PM on 6-22-2007
I think for a lot of business men it is important to edit. I am not saying they will be writing entire documents on there. but the ability for a coworker to send you a draft of a report and then you send it back with different numbers or something is key. Apple may not have such businessy people in mind, but they will definitely be losing a lot of them when the palm phones have great office editing capabilites.
Another thing about Palm. I don't hear a lot of people complaining about the instability of the Palm OS... yet it has hundreds of small apps written for it. I think they just don't want to have to admit how limited the "full" osx of the iPhone truly is.
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dumas said 2:12PM on 6-22-2007
I've had 3 Palm OS Treos, 3 Windows Mobile phones, and 1
Blackberry (best of the bunch). I had the capability to edit docs and
spreadsheets on the Palm and WM phones, but am not sure about the BB
because it's not something I ever tried doing. I've used smart phones for
internet and business since the Treo 180 back in 2002 and NEVER have
I edited a spreadsheet or doc.
That being said, I probably won't buy an iPhone unless playing with the keyboard sells me on it. I'm skeptical a non-tactile keyboard can be as good as the one on my BB. I'd be all over the widescreen iPod though.
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Josh H. said 2:14PM on 6-22-2007
@1 You have to remember this is the first generation iPhone...Palm has been around for a while and has had time to perfect their OS...Apple is new to this businesss...ehh kinda...anyways...eventually i know there will be normal apps
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Chris Rowland said 2:15PM on 6-22-2007
This is reassuring, but it's a shame that you can't view powerpoint slides :-( I love having the ability to take a quick peek at lecture slides whilst on the go.
I've used word on Windows Mobile, but normally only for note taking, so I guess "Notes" ought to be a good enough replacement, providing that notes are in a format that could be emailed to people.
Having excel on your phone is most beneficial when you write a spreadsheet to calculate things eg. Give a quote for services. You can write web app to do this, but to be honest you shouldn't be forcing people to do that.
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Steve Sande said 2:23PM on 6-22-2007
Nahhhh, I've had two Treos and more Windows Mobile devices than I can shake a stick at, and I've NEVER edited a Word or Excel file on the device. Just being able to view them will be nice.
Steve
www.iphoneranch.com
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lak said 2:26PM on 6-22-2007
I use my PPC to edit docs all the time for work.... sadly I think a lot of business folks do.
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Steve Sande said 2:35PM on 6-22-2007
Re: PowerPoint. You can take ANY Mac document and print it to a PDF, so that should make it simple to move presentations to an iPhone.
Tough luck for Windows users unless MSFT finally added print to PDF to Vista.
Steve
www.iphoneranch.com
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Kwahnoom said 2:39PM on 6-22-2007
I find Apple's marketing strategy interesting. All this week (and presumably throughout next week too), Apple has been releasing new info about the iPhone bit by bit. This definitely builds up the momentum of buzz (not likely there hasn't already been enough though).
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Marty said 2:40PM on 6-22-2007
Given all the rumors of google apps on the iPhone, how long before we get editing capability through google docs?
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Pieter said 2:41PM on 6-22-2007
you can still use Google Docs & Spreadsheets, if you're desperate…
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iDarbert said 2:42PM on 6-22-2007
A friend of mine has a crappy S60 Nokias which can edit word documents (not sure about Excels), it looks odd that no smartphones can do that.
Also, won't the Treos run DocumentsToGo since they use PalmOS?
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Chris Rowland said 2:45PM on 6-22-2007
Steve,
I can print to PDF when I remember to, but that doesn't solve the issue of me being emailed powerpoint slides, or all of the powerpoint slides on my departments website.
There are plenty of ways to work around the issues that the iPhone still has, but there are only so many hoops you can make people jump through to do it the "apple way" before they won't bother and will just stick with what they're used to.
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bradah said 2:59PM on 6-22-2007
I'm wondering how much of a road block the non-replaceable battery will be for those on the fence. Business people, especially, would be ticked if their battery died on the train during an important call......
Maybe we'll find with more news releases next week that it IS replaceable.
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backnine said 3:28PM on 6-22-2007
I imagine editing documents with it is not going to be a big deal, as Apple's relationship with Google means you can almost automatically assume you will be editing your word/excel docs online using Google's tools. Sounds smart to me, offline reading, online editing.
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derek said 3:42PM on 6-22-2007
i could easily make an app to edit the documents if they don't...
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Jonathan said 4:01PM on 6-22-2007
could it be that this is some form of quicklook (leopard)
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Paul said 4:19PM on 6-22-2007
Still no hint of voice dial, and it still looks as if you can't use your own MP3's as ringtones, leading me to believe that AT&T is going to force you to buy their crappy selection. I want my plain jane old fashioned telephone bell, and nothing else, darnit!
So, if (and I will wait and see on release day), if there is no voice dial, no replaceable battery and no way to use my iTunes tracks as ringtones, then I would feel much less enthusiastic about it.
Of course, if someone were to hack the phone to address the ringtone thing, and if Apple were to definitively say "yes there is voice dial from your bluetooth headset" then I might overlook the big crippling battery thing.
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Paul said 4:29PM on 6-22-2007
whoops! wrong thread - mods go ahead and delete. ;-)
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Douglas A. Brace said 4:54PM on 6-22-2007
iPhone can view DOC and XLS files but can it view DOCX and XLSX files associated with Office 2007?
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mayo said 5:37PM on 6-22-2007
Didn't his Steveness say in the previous keynote (the one last year) that you could use your own tunes as ring tones? Or am I dreaming it? Might as well, since iPhones won't make itpu here to Canada until who knows when...
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