iWork.com sharing not working on some Windows browsers

Along with Apple's latest iWork suite, the company also offers an online collaboration service "iWork.com" where you have 1GB of storage space to share files with anyone via the Web or e-mail. However, when iWork users try to access files with windows machines, there may be some compatibility issues.

Apple Discussion poster "Holton" writes:

"I have been using iWork.com Beta at work since it was introduced and I love it except one problem. When my co-workers, PC guys, try to follow the link I email them most were unable to view the document. I discovered they had to have at least IE 7. Anything earlier and it will not open. It prompts them to download Safari or Firefox...Also when they updated their copy of IE to 7 or 8 they still could not download a copy of the document to PDF."

There can be several reasons that other users (PC or otherwise) cannot access the documents on iWork.com. The first is that currently the service requires a "modern browser," according to the requirements. This means they need to install the latest version of a current mainstream browser if they are planning to use iWork.com. Several users have had troubles with Internet Explorer 6, and test releases of new browsers may show problems. Since the service is still in "beta," you will be best served by using the latest "stable" version of a browser and not run any test or "nightly builds" of browsers. If you are experiencing browser problems, try clearing the browser's cache and cookies, and ensure it is updated to the latest version before trying again.

In addition to unexpected bugs with various browsers, there is a known incompatibility with Internet Explorer versions 7 and 8, where special characters in file names might prevent the browser from downloading files. Apple outlines this in a recent knowledgebase article and recommends you stick to standard alphanumeric characters and use underscores instead of spaces in file names.

If you know of compatibility problems between iWork.com and any specific browser, please let us know: http://www.macfixit.com/contact.

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