Rest in peace Steve. You will be missed.

Patently Apple has news that Apple has won a patent regarding Numbers.

A method for associating an object with a data source, comprising: receiving an indication of a selection of an option to paste in a first document an object or a copy of an object cut or copied from a second document; determining a data source identifier associated with the object; and associating the object with a corresponding data source such that when the object is pasted into the first document the object is automatically associated with a data source included in the first document; wherein the data source with which the object is associated comprises: a data source having the data source identifier included in a current paste board that is concurrently pasted into the first document with the object if a data source having the data source identifier exists in the current paste board; an existing data source having the data source identifier included in the first document if a data source having the data source identifier does not exist in the current paste board and if a data source having the data source identifier exists in the first document; or an automatically generated new data source added to the first document that is populated with data extracted from the object if a data source having the data source identifier does not exist in the current paste board and if a data source having the data source identifier does not already exist in the first document.

Clear? I thought so.

Patent number 8,006,194 was originally filed in August 2007 and lists Peter Berger, Peter Rapp, Michael Trent, Christopher Weeldreyer as inventors.

Apple announced today that all of its iWork productivity suite (Numbers, Pages and Keynote) will now be available for the iPhone and iPod Touch, in addition to the iPad.  The apps are available in the app store for $9.99 each.

Apple iWork Now Available For iPhone & iPod touch Users

Update: These are universal apps, so if you have already purchased Numbers, or one of the other apps, you do not have to buy another version.  The update to Numbers 1.4 weighs in at 118 MB.

A lot of Numbers users also use Excel, so I thought it worth sharing that Office for Mac 2011 Service Pack 1 is now available for download.

It weighs in at 246MB and includes fixes for “critical issues” and improves security.

Apple recently updated Numbers for iPad to version 1.3. Improvements include:

• Wireless printing with AirPrint using iOS 4.2, including page range selection, number of copies, and duplex printing.
• Print preview to adjust how a sheet prints across multiple pages, including Auto Fit.
• PDF export takes advantage of pagination settings from print preview.
• Formula entry using a keyboard, including predictive function selector.
• Support for iOS 4.2 multitasking.
• Localized in Portuguese, Danish, Finnish, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Swedish, and Traditional Chinese.
• Improved reliability when importing Numbers ’09 and Microsoft Excel spreadsheets.
• Improved usability.
• Fixed issues when using a WebDAV server, including signing out when a server is no longer accessible, saving port numbers in server addresses, and saving files with invalid characters in their names.
• Improved PDF export using iOS 4.2, which resolves an issue with missing fonts on Windows.

Numbers for iPad version 1.3 is available as a free update on the app store.

New iWork 9.0.4 update now available. As usual, they were not very descriptive as to what is actually included.

Generally:

iWork Update 4 is recommended for iWork 9.0, 9.0.1, 9.0.2, and 9.0.3. It addresses issues in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers, and adds export compatibility to Pages for the standard ePub file format (for use with iBooks).

Numbers Specific:

Numbers 2.0.4

• Fixes an issue with tables.

The update is ~156 MB.

Here is a link to the knowledge base article dealing with the update: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4165

You can download the release through Software Update.

Apple released iWork Update 3 on October 7, 2009, and if your Mac hasn’t already prompted you that an update is available, you can get it by choosing Software Update from the Apple () menu.

Here’s what is new:

All iWork 9.0.3 Applications

• Addresses general compatibility issues
• Updates the help
• Adds a link to online resources in the Help menu
• Improves image handling when reducing the file size of images with Instant Alpha applied
• Improves file size management when inserting some movies

Numbers 2.0.3

• Fixes an issue with columns and categorized checkboxes
• Addresses an issue with categories and CSV export
• Improves reliability of import and export of some Microsoft Excel files
• Addresses an issue that could cause formulas to stop working after formatting a cell
• Fixes an issue with hiding or deleting rows in categorized tables
• Improves reliability when reverting a document to the saved version
• Addresses an issue caused by quitting without saving after editing some templates
• Fixes an issue with deleting table columns containing chart data
• Resolves an issue that prevented dropping an audio file into a media place holder

iWork.com beta

• Enhances security with 128-bit SSL encryption and document password protection
• Improves document reviewing capabilities with Comment notification features
• E-mail invitations are now sent via iWork.com instead of using Mac OS X Mail

The Apple Blog has a nice write up on conditional formatting in Numbers.

The real power behind spreadsheets is not just how well they can crunch data, but how you can visually present the information in a variety of ways. Sometimes, however, you may want to give more attention to a particular area, or hide certain data if it’s not relevant. You often see conditional formatting applied to financial spreadsheets where positive values are in black or green, but negative values are always in “the red.” So how do you do that? It’s where conditional formatting, or formatting based on certain criteria, comes into play.

In case you haven’t noticed, files saved under Numbers ‘09 will not open under Numbers ‘08.  In fact, the file format incompatibility issue also affects Pages and Keynote.

Why did Apple do this?  Tom Reestman gives a good explanation over on the Apple Blog.  The short answer: it makes files easier to share across systems via email.

iWork ‘08 files were saved as packages, iWork ‘09 files are saved as flat files.

I haven’t tried this yet, but it looks interesting. Anyone using Numbers for heavy statistical work?

Risk Engine for iWork Numbers

Risk Engine links into iWork Numbers and Microsoft Excel 2008 spreadsheet models to allow you to run detailed Monte Carlo analyses with multiple inputs and outputs. The input values for the Monte-Carlo simulation can be directly modified by the user within the spreadsheet interface to allow for maximum flexibility within the simulation.

New in version 1.2.1:

• Bug in exporting data into Microsoft Excel has been corrected
• Improved user entry of statistical parameters to allow greater decimal accuracy
• Improved export and reporting of output data by keeping the order of the data
• Added the ability to switch between Monte-Carlo data model and the original data model

Risk Engine 1.2.1