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Joined: 2/5/2013
Posts: 3
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Hi All,
I've been noticing that many submissions requirements on agent and editor websites require .rtf formatting. I use a Mac and have the iWork suite - that's Pages for the word processing software. Unfortunately, Mac (or maybe it's just Pages) really sucks at converting into an .rtf. Essentially it looks like a wordpad document when I open it on my computer, the formatting totally wrecked, forget my carefully crafted page numbers, headers, etc.
Is there a better way to do this formatting on a Mac than the standard 'share -> export' option? Is .rtf just industry standard? And if so, WHY???, and what can I do to make sure that I am able to present a professional looking manuscript?
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Joined: 2/5/2013
Posts: 3
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PS - obviously I will get the Microsoft Suite if that's what it takes, but I would like to state for the record that I love Pages and hate Word so very, very much. 
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Joined: 2/27/2011
Posts: 353
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Anna -
When I was an agent, I wanted .rtf files because they can be sideloaded onto most e-ink readers easily. I read all my submissions on my ereader, as do most agents these days.
Pages for Mac is not industry standard for anyone. MS Word is. Eventually you may want to shell out the $100 for a personal edition of MS Office just to make sure your files are compatible with most agents' and editors' software.
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Joined: 8/29/2014
Posts: 7
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Anna there is also LibreOffice and OpenOffice, both free that can open and save in all the M$ formats. In fact I've never had an issue with formatting between the them and word. And both run on the big three (*nix, Mac, win). I have a preference for LibreOffice, but that is mostly just becauzse Oracle that owns OpenOffice, shut it down after an ultimatium backfired. Oracle told their programmers they had to quit from the OpenDocument Foundation, or they had to leave. They lost most of their programmers, and they took the code (its open source so totally legal) and created LibreOffice, Libre means Free or Freedom.
Ohh and there is a portable version available as well. Lives on your USB drive and runs off any computer that can run a windows program. So if you don't have a laptop you can do your writing away from home regardless of what software is available on the computer your borrowing. There are other apps available that you might find as useful as well.
I hope this helps.
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