How do I work out what pages templates have in them ?

Question

I think i do this !
how do I work out what pages templates have in them ?

Answer 1

Hi c,
"Instinctive" (and "Intuitive", the more common term) seem to be often used where "what you're used to" would be a more accurate choice. Nothing about Page Layout is particularly instinctive if you've never done it before.
Regarding 'greying out' some of the tools: Tools and menu items go grey when they aren't available. For example, you can't move an object to the front if you don't have an object selected (or if the selected object is the only thing in the document), or if the selected object is already further forward than anything else in the document. Anytime it is possible to use the tool/menu item in the current context, the tool/item will be active, and shown in dark type.
You mention you are headed toward a "business plan/power point thing." The first (business plan) makes me think in terms of print, and something to be produced from a word processing template rather than page layout one. The second part say 'this will be projected on a screen' and says 'Keynote would be a better application for this task than Pages.'
Keynote is a presentation tool, designed to produce documents that will be presented on a screen (ie. designed for the same type of documents as Powerpoint was built to produce).
Pages has two basic document types, both aimed at producing documents that will be printed:
Word processing—used for things like letters and reports. In general, documents that are mostly text, but that may have some illustrations, charts, or other graphics objects inserted into them.
Page layout—used where there's a mix of graphics and text, with the text usually coming in smaller chunks.
The biggest difference between them is that a 'blank' page layout document is really 'blank'. It can be thought of as a page sized blank canvas onto which you can place containers for text (text boxes), shapes, images, charts, or containers (placeholders) for images or other objects.
A blank word processing document can also accept the objects and containers listed above, but also includes a text layer (where text can be entered directly, without the need to place it into a text box), and a background layer (where objects can be placed behind the text layer).
If the above helps you choose the type of document you want to have as the end product, we can then take a look at one of the templates for that type and look at deconstructing it.
Regards,
Barry