Collaborate on documents

They say a problem shared is a problem halved. Pages. Numbers and Keynote have you more than covered with their collaborative tools

Once, disappointment and frustration were the two characters you were most likely to meet when collaborating with others on Numbers, Pages or Keynote documents. It’s different now. Big improvements to those apps for iCloud mean multiple users can work on the same doc simultaneously, whether using a Mac, iPad, iPhone or even a PC. Here’s how to get the best out of collaboration features.

1 All or nothing

You can either share a document publicly – anyone with the link can open the document and pass the link on – or with specific people. Sharing with named people is more secure, but also more fiddly: collaborators need to sign in with an Apple ID.

2 Feature limitations

Some features are disabled when you share a document. For example, in Numbers you can’t copy or paste sheets; in Keynote you can’t view or edit master slides, and in Pages there’s no way to edit master objects. If you need these features, temporarily stop sharing the doc: click Collaborate in the toolbar and then the Stop Sharing button. This removes the doc from collaborators’ iCloud Drives. If you shared a link to the doc, that link will still work when you share it again. But if you limited access to invited people, you’ll need to re-invite them.

3 Shrink size

If you plan to collaborate on a large doc, reduce bandwidth by shrinking its size in advance (File > Reduce File Size). You can do this even after sharing the doc, as this option is still available while collaborating.

4 Recovering files

Let’s say a collaborator deletes content by accident. There’s no need to panic – you can recover it. On a Mac, choose File > Revert To > Browse All Versions and navigate to the last good version. It’s better to do this on a Mac than iCloud.com; while you can recover a previous version there – click Tools, then Browse All Versions – you can only restore versions in their entirety. You can’t compare past versions, or select parts of a doc to recover.

5 Work offline

Numbers, Pages and Keynote won’t panic if you lose your internet connection. On a Mac they won’t let you make changes while offline – you’ll be asked to work on a copy – but on iCloud.com, you can carry on and changes will appear to collaborators when you’re online again.

6 Check what’s shared

To check what you’re sharing, open iCloud Drive on your Mac (Go > iCloud Drive in Finder). Shared docs have ‘Shared by Me’ after their names (or on the right in Column view). To see who a file is shared with, ≈-click it and choose Share > Show People. Here you can also adjust sharing permissions.

7 Check people’s tools

Not everyone can collaborate. Windows users need Microsoft Edge or Google Chrome to use iCloud.com. In older versions of Numbers, Keynote and Pages or on Android, you can view but not edit docs. Sharing via email, Messages, or AirDrop provides a copy, so lacks real-time collaboration.

8 Check activities

Clicking Collaborate in the toolbar lists current participants. Click the coloured dot next to a name to jump to where they’re working. Or, if you spot a coloured editing indicator within a doc, click it to reveal the editor’s identity.

Who’s working? The number next to the Collaborate button shows the number of participants actively working on the currently shared document. Real-time changes Collaborators’ changes and comments appear in the shared document impressively quickly, and you can respond immediately to comments in threaded conversations!

In Finder, shared status is listed next to filenames in most views, and in column view’s right pane.

Avoid conflict Click the coloured dot next to a collaborator’s name in the participant list to jump to where they are working in the shared document. This is a handy tool to avoid editing conflicts. 3 Recognise your authors Collaborators can choose their own author colours on the Mac in View > Comments & Changes > Author Colour, or on iCloud.com in the preferences pane under the Tools icon. Change your mind You can change collaboration options at any time. If you change a document to ‘invite only’, all permissions will be revoked and the document is removed from collaborators’ iCloud Drives.

Can’t remember which colours are assigned to collaborators? Names are just a click away.