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AdrianCobon

macrumors member
Original poster
Apr 25, 2014
33
46
Indianapolis, Indiana
Since 2012 I have used Numbers to help my grandfather with his hobby business. Nothing major, just typing up the monthly invoices for his clients and, during tax time, figuring out how much he paid all the contractors.

He is now "retiring." There isn't a need for his side gig in the current economy, so why waste the time it takes when there are more fun things to do?

Before 2012, my grandmother used Microsoft Excel to create invoices for him. They looked atrocious - not from anything she did, but because of the paradigm imposed by Microsoft. There were no guides she could use to make them look professional. There was so little help in the app itself that she didn't know how to use formulas to do the heavy lifting.

So when I had a whack at it, I decided to use Numbers '09 since it was already my favorite spreadsheet tool. The results were terrific, and I took what was an hour-long typing fest and made it a five-minute task.

As a digital marketer and editor, I have worked with many small companies worldwide and found that I wasn't alone in turning to iWork. iWork is used by more people than is acknowledged simply because it works without having to deal with monthly fees or sorting out which of the thousand-plus features available will work best in that particular situation.

I feel a bit nostalgic opening up the app now, even though it is only used for that one purpose. I have long since moved to other billing tools for my own work, but iWork will always remind me of looking over handwritten notes every month and double-checking the numbers.
 
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I haven't really used Numbers ever since Apple dumbed it down to be more iOS-like. Haven't found the need to return to see if it's improved since then.
 
I haven't really used Numbers ever since Apple dumbed it down to be more iOS-like. Haven't found the need to return to see if it's improved since then.
Depends on your need. I think it works for something small; but this is coming from someone that used Excel for some large processing. (50MB files, with 1000s of lines of data, multiple sheets, plus formulas and VBA)
 
I haven't really used Numbers ever since Apple dumbed it down to be more iOS-like. Haven't found the need to return to see if it's improved since then.
It works alright if you are doing simple home accounting or crafting invoices for printing/PDF emails. However, I wouldn't use it for anything major.
 
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