Word Processing Vs Page Layout Modes In Mac Pages

There are two different modes in Mac Pages. It is important to know the differences between these modes and when to use Word Processing Mode or Page Layout Mode.

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Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com. Today let's look at the difference between Word Processing Mode and Page Layout Mode in Mac Pages. 
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So when using Pages you have the choice between two different modes for every document. There's word processing mode and page layout mode. When you're working in Pages there are several different ways to tell which mode you're in. One is to go to the File Menu. If you see Convert to Page Layout then you know you're in Word Processing Mode. Whereas if you see Convert to Word Processing then you know you're in Page Layout mode. You could also go to the Document Sidebar here. If you look for Document Body that is checked that means you're in word processing mode. If it's not checked then you're in page layout mode. There are other ways to tell as well. For instance iin the document sidebar if you see Section and Bookmarks, those are properties of Word Processing Mode. If you don't see them there that means you're in Page Layout Mode. Plus, if you go to View and then Show Layouts you'll see a large box here that covers the entire page. This is the Body Text. If you see that it usually means that you're in Word Processing Mode.
So what are the two different modes for? Well, Word Processing Mode is for when you're writing a regular document. Either a book, like a novel, or a long report that shows page after page of text. This is most of what we use word processors for. In Word Processing Mode you're going to have this body text here that's automatically on every page. If you were to fill it with text you would see that it creates new pages, like it created this second page here, with the text falling from one page to the other. All inside this large body text element that's on every page. If I were to go to View, Show Page Thumbnails here I could see each page. If I added more text you could see how it adds even more pages and the text just flows from page to page.
Now let me convert this to Page Layout Mode. Now this is dangerous to do if you already put text in the body text because it's going to get rid of it. So you can see the body text is now gone. Now you can see here the difference is that there's no body text element in the middle of the page. There's just nothing there. You still have your Header and Footer here which I see because remember I turned on Show Layout here. But there's nothing on the page. I can't just add text to it. I have to add an element that contains text like, for instance, a text box. Now I can actually add text to this text box, position it to where I want, size it where I want, and all of that. So Page Layout Mode is good for creating things like newsletters and flyers. Anything where you want text and other items to appear as individual elements on a page. Not text that flows from page to page automatically.
Now it's important to realize in both word processing and page layout modes you can still add all of these individual elements, like text boxes, shapes, and images. These things work in both modes. So the main difference really is in Word Processing Mode you have this flowing body text that goes from page to page. In fact you can pretty much create anything that you do in Page Layout Mode in Word Processing Mode as long as you're willing to ignore the body text that's there on every page. It can actually get in the way quite a bit if you're not using it.
When you're using Page Layout Mode you can still have text flow from page to page. You just need to create separate text boxes like this and if you select one and you click here you can then go and select this one and you can see it flows from one to the other. It will adjust as I increase the size of this and more text is in here there's going to be different text picking up where this left off. Of course you can put these on different pages. So I can add another page here and you could see I've got page 2. If I add a text box here I could click here, select this as one and then go here and select this as 2. Now text will still flow from page 1 to page 2 because it's flowing from this text box to this text box. So that's how you can create a newsletter and that say has a couple of columns of text on page 1 and then the story continues on page 4.
Now word processing documents have something called sections. You would add a section by simply inserting a Section Break that creates another section. This allows you to separate parts of your text like perhaps different chapters into different sections. Different sections can be dragged and reordered here in the left sidebar where its individual pages cannot because the text is flowing page to page. Swapping page 2 and page 3 really doesn't make a difference because the text is still going to flow from 1 to 2 to 3. But having sections where maybe you have chapters from both that you want to rearrange that makes sense. Plus sections could have different Headers and Footers and page numbering and all of that. That's all part of word processing. Word Processing documents could also have Bookmarks which are a property of the Body Text.
Page Layout Mode doesn't have sections because in a sense every single page is its own section. You can create pages and you can rearrange them as you want. So it's almost like Pages are slides in a Keynote presentation. Every page is its own individual element. Not only that but you can add Page Templates. Go to View, Edit Page Templates you can create different page templates. I can add one here and call this one Test. Now I've got Blank and Test and I could put different things on each template. So, for instance, in this template here I'm going to put a box here at the upper left hand corner. In this template here I'm going to put a circle at the upper left hand corner. Maybe make it a different color. So I've got two different templates here. So now when I exit Template Mode you can see this is using template 1. I can switch here under Format to a different template. I can add a page here and then I have to choose which template I want to add. So every page can follow its own template. If I go in and change a template, like this, maybe I'll change this to be a different color, then that changes those template elements for every single page where that template is used. The individual elements on the page are different so I can add some text here, for instance. This is just on page 3. It's not on page 1. It's not part of the template but the green box is.
Another thing to consider about Page Layout Mode is that the Headers are kind of universal. They go through all of the pages here. You can't break things up into sections so you can't have one section with one type of Header and one section with another type of Header. But, you can use Templates to do whatever you want. So if you Edit the templates here I could create a text box and I could put a page number in here I'll just do Insert Page Number like that. I can make it nice and big and bold and put it to the right. Put it up there and this is just going to be in this template and not this one. So now when I look at the pages that using this template there's the number 1. But it's not on this template but it is on this template. So you can setup your templates however you want to simulate sections if you like.
So in most cases it's going to be really obvious which mode you want to be in. If you're writing something that's going to just have flowing text from page to page then you want Word Processing Mode. If you're creating something like a newsletter or flyer or poster, something like that, then you're going to want to use Page Layout Mode. There are times when we have to pick one or the other and the features largely overlap. If you want text to flow from one page to the next you could use link text boxes. Or if you want Pages Layout Element on a regular word processing document you could certainly add those. However, it's important to take into consideration what you're publishing here. If you are publishing an e-pub document, something that's that standard ebook format then you really want to use word processing because e-pub documents are like novels. They flow from page to page. You're going to want to have that body text there. However, if you're creating something like a pdf then it really doesn't matter. You can use either one and if your document calls for a kind of page layout style then you're going to want to use Page Layout. Publishing it as a pdf or printing it isn't really going to care which mode you're in.
Hope you found this useful. Thanks for watching.

Comments: 3 Responses to “Word Processing Vs Page Layout Modes In Mac Pages”

nick

1 month ago

Hey Gary, I have reports with a mix of text and graphics. I like the text flow of the word processing mode, but I have to be aware of how graphics will impact it. My workflow is write all the text and then place images after, controlling how the text behaves around graphics. What's the best strategy to use when I want to jump to a new page? Inserting a page in processing mode places a hidden code that can throw text out of whack when I insert graphics. Should I use Sections instead?

Gary Rosenzweig

nick: I would just use Page Breaks. That's what they are for. But you can use Sections if you want. Learn how to use both and decide. See https://macmost.com/understanding-page-and-section-breaks-in-pages.html

Howard

Gary, thanks for the video. I've authored & published 4 books using MS Word for the interior text and Pages for the front & back covers, and the flaps. I've tried several page layout apps and nothing worked as well as Pages. However, I was not using page layout to design the covers with graphics and text. You just made it much easier for me to show how to use page layout especially continuing text from the front flap of the dust jacket to the back flap. Again thanks.

Word Processing Vs Page Layout Modes In Mac Pages

Comments: 3 Responses to “Word Processing Vs Page Layout Modes In Mac Pages”

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