converting Pages docs without having Pages?

November 21, 2005 4:42 PM

Is there a way convert an Apple Pages document into something that Open- or MS- Office can use, without having access to Pages?
posted by john m to computers & internet (6 comments total)

If you don't mind a stranger seeing the document, email it to me (email in profile) and I can open it in Pages and convert it to a .doc for you then send it back.
posted by toddshot at 5:22 PM on November 21, 2005

For what it's worth, I've never seen a convertor program in all my time surfing the Mac software sites. If you get desperate, you can get the text out -- it's just a custom XML document at its heart.
posted by chrismear at 5:24 PM on November 21, 2005

toddshot -- thanks for the offer, but there are *many* files.
posted by john m at 5:29 PM on November 21, 2005

Ah, gotcha. Well, if you're near an Apple store, you could load the files onto a flash drive and bring em over to convert them on a demo machine. I doubt the staff would mind.
posted by toddshot at 5:51 PM on November 21, 2005

You could install the beta of OS X for x86 in VMWare (or a native install) and do it with that. Not that I'm recommending that or anything.
posted by abcde at 9:04 PM on November 21, 2005

Hmm, I was going to say this should be AppleScriptable or Automatorable, but as far as I can tell Pages doesn't have the necessary hooks for either tool. That's unfortunate. Maybe I just have an old version?

I second the "take it into an Apple Store" suggestion. Might be worth checking with the staff first, though. I remember there being a fuss about people stealing software off floor machines using ipods a while back. They might be sensitive to people hooking up storage devices now.
posted by heresiarch at 7:18 AM on November 22, 2005