In an email to users of iBooks Author Apple said that the tool is being discontinued on July 1. Writers should transition to Pages, where Apple will continue to add book creation features.
iBooks Author
iBooks Author will be available on macOS 10.15 and earlier for people who already have it installed. Books published to Apple Books using this tool will also continue to be available. The email:
Thank you for being a member of the iBooks Author community. We have some news to share with you about the future of book creation.
Two years ago we brought book creation into Pages. With key features such as the ability to work on iPad, collaborate with others on a shared book, draw with Apple Pencil, and more, Pages is a great platform for making books.
As we focus our efforts on Pages, iBooks Author will no longer be updated and will soon be removed from the Mac App Store. You can continue to use iBooks Author on macOS 10.15 and earlier, and books previously published to Apple Books will remain available. If you have iBooks Author books you’d like to import into Pages for further editing, we have a book import feature coming to Pages soon.
Apple has a support page for writers transitioning to Pages, and says a future update to the app will allow books to be imported. You can find Pages on the Mac App Store here.
I use iBooksAuthor since it came out in 2012 and published 28 books, with the exception of on, all in the Enhanced iBOok format.
I can’t believe that Apple is doing this messed-up decisions again. Who is running the show? Remember the debacle with Final Cut Pro X that cost Apple the lead in the video editing? The disaster upgrade of Pages, when they downgraded the app and took five years to come close to a feature parity of the old Pages 4?
Now the same disaster with iBooks Author. Pretending that Pages will be a substitute is a joke. No mention of the interactive features or the Enhanced iBooks format at all.
Even if a future Pages will have some features, what is the rush? That makes no sense. Why not release the new Pages with the updated features and announce then the demise of iBooks Author. What happened to the Apple policy of not talking about future products or updates.
I’m afraid, this is a smoke screen to hide the bigger, more painful decision. Apple seems to discontinue the Enhanced iBooks format.
Somewhat sad to see this, but not surprised. I tried to use it several tines and always fell back to Pages or something like that.