An interesting thing happened when I switched to a Macbook. My dates of skirting around pirate ships pretty much went by the wayside. Purchasing software became my new norm. Today was a test of my patience though.
I had a client who was years behind on upgrading her Macbook Pro. The screen was literally falling apart after who knows what kind of major impact to the chassis. This particular client is a PhD and does a lot of research and periodically has to do important presentations. After a few weeks of struggling back and forth with an impending deadline looming, she was finally convinced to buy a new Macbook Pro. Immediately her productivity shot up, and she was back on track.
There was just one problem. She had created quite a few Keynote presentations using the older iWork package. As it turns out, Keynote 6.x has some issues opening those older presentations. Yep – the new version of Keynote just doesn’t like those older files.
As a matter of fact, if you have a brand new Macbook and don’t have access to a functioning older one – you are pretty much stuck. Almost.
Apple doesn’t offer a download for the older version, and they don’t even offer a converter. Basically, you are left high and dry with your old presentations.
Notice I said “almost” earlier though. Here are the instructions.
- Download the trial version of iWork ’09 and install it. Even if you have Keynote 6.x installed.
- Open Keynote using the “Buy” button and enter this serial: 93G9-PE44-KRJE-QANS-EK5F-5S2
- Now try to open your older Keynote file – you should get a dialogue box now giving you the option to “Open in Keynote ’09” — open the file in ’09.
- Now simply save the keynote with a new name (that way you don’t overwrite the original just in case)
- Open the new name file in Keynote 6.x (the new one).
That’s all there is too it. Of course that means you have to open each file and save it, but at least you have your presentations back.
ps: h/t out to this Cult of Mac article for the iWork ’09 link and to this Youtube Video for the serial number.