Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
No, I agree - you use Excel. Microsoft virtually give away Word and Excel in OEM versions with new PCs, student editions, etc, and I believe that they are similarly ubiquitous on the Mac.
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There is no Excel for linux, unix, iPad or Android.
And even the student copy of Office is not free.
Only the monopoly status of Microsoft Office has inspired folks to dedicate millions of dollars and years of time reverse engineering what support we do have today.
Microsoft Access? gotta have Access.
Microsoft Publisher? gotta have Publisher.
Visual Basic? works only on windows...as do the apps created.
Sql Server? Windows only.
Far and away the dominant ebook platform is Amazon. Does it support the "industry standard" epub? Nope.
If you want to sell commercial ebooks using ePub....and you want to protect your IP via DRM....the "industry standard" is Adobe ePub.
Is it free? No it is not. It costs the publishers a pretty penny.
Folks...you are expecting WAY MORE of Apple than any other company is delivering.
Apple has spent millions developing the iBook Author app to enable folks to easily create content FOR THE IPAD. That's how Apple makes it's money, selling iPads.
If you make your money selling text books...Apple has a very nice plan to help you make a lot of money by supporting the iPad platform. It will be up to the textbook producers to decide if this "free tool" is worth it to them.
Lee