Iwork

While some may still scoff at the iPad as a productivity powerhouse, thanks to spectacular software and, optionally, a kickass portable keyboard, the smart and savvy among us know the iPad can be the best way to get things done while on the go. Wether you're in business or in school, whether you need to create new documents, spreadsheets, or presentations from scratch or simply edit your words, numbers, and slides to perfection, a mobile office suite can quickly go from being a nice-to-have to a must-have to a real life (or career/class) saver.

And the iPad has several excellent office suite options to choose from. Apple's iWork comes as three separate apps, Pages, Keynote, and Numbers. BlackBerry-maker RIM's Documents To Go is an integrated, Microsoft-like powerhouse. And Google's newly acquired Quickoffice Pro HD likewise offers everything all in one place. But which is the best for you and your workflow?

One of the huge disappointments of Pages for iPhone and iPad is there are only two paper sizes available: US Letter and A4. Even worse, is that you can't even create a document with these sizes in landscape! However, if you first create the document in Pages for Mac and open it with Pages on your iPhone or iPad, the document size and orientation will remain unchanged.

Keynote is all you need to create, edit, and give stunning presentations straight from your iPhone or iPad

Apple's Keynote is the presentation component of their iWork productivity suite of software, and a companion app to Pages for word processing and Numbers for spreadsheets. All three are universal apps that work on iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad, and popular choices for document management on the go. They've also just been updated to support iOS 5.1 and the new iPad's Retina display.

If you're a new iPad or iPhone owner and need a way to create, edit, and give presentations on the go, Keynote is Apple's iCloud integrated solution. It was designed for Apple's late co-founder, Steve Jobs, and the desktop version was used to give every one of his presentations, including the original iPhone and iPad introductions.

Does it work just as well on iOS?

iWork for iOS has just been updated with many new features including brand new 3D charts, animations  and various other features. Each iWork app will be available for the same $9.99 price point and as a free update for existing owners.

The update will be available starting today and is a universal binary for both iPhone and iPad. We are assuming the new features in the update will be available to all iOS devices. iWork currently already integrates well for iCloud users making it easy to take your work on the go and pick up right where you left off when you get back to your computer.