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From: Gary Britt 

After posting that question about what does the ribbon interface do, I went to
the MS website and looked at their explanations and a couple demos.

 From what I gather the Ribbon interface is just an iconized version of the
old display most recently used menu items.  An option I always immediately turn
OFF.  In fact besides accomplishing the goal of scrambling the interface around
(and I hated the few menu changes in Word XP/2003 versus Word 2000 and those
changes were nothing compared to how things have been scrambled around in Word
2007), they did add one new set of features.  The "live previews" and
"galleries" as they call them does look like a nice feature.  However, that
feature isn't worth relearning a new interface and re-writing macros, etc.

I concede that its possible that the new ribbon interface is a better way for
morons who don't know how to actually use word 2000/XP/2003 (which sadly is 90%
or more of all MS users) might actually accomplish slightly more sophisticated
formatting with the ribbon interface.  However, since these are morons after
all its ridiculous to think they will know what the icons mean or when to
properly use them.  Live preview and the galleries might mean that they manage
to get a nicely formatted chart into an otherwise poorly crafted and formatted
document.

Microsoft could have allowed for a check box to provide the old
file/menus/toolbars with a new toolbar for live preview and galleries together
with the option to turn on the ribbon interface.  That would have made the most
sense to me in terms of smoothing any transition, but they either felt that was
too hard or not worth the effort for the very few users of their products that
actually know how to use their software.

How long before somebody does exactly what I just described and comes out with
a word 2000/xp/2003 add-on that provides the live preview and galleries
functionality that is the only good new feature I see in the ribbon interface?

Gary

Rich Gauszka wrote:
> Probably force you to buy the Microsoft Ribbons for Dummies book 
>
> I really like text in my menus
>
> "Gary Britt" 
wrote in message
> news:4592f165$1{at}w3.nls.net...
>> What's the status of the law on "look and feel" type
lawsuits??  If
>> Microsoft tries to sue for someone not licensing from them and putting out
>> their own ribbon interface do they have a legal leg to stand on??  Anyone
>> know?
>>
>> What's so great about the ribbon?  It just looks like it takes up a whole
>> lot of screen real estate with a bunch of icons in rows?  Am I wrong?
>> What does the big round application button do?
>>
>> Gary
>>
>> John Beamish wrote:
>>> I wonder what MS thinks of this:
>>>
http://www.devexpress.com/Products/NET/WinForms/XtraBars/Features_Ribbon.xm
l
>>> On Wed, 27 Dec 2006 15:48:56 -0500, Rich Gauszka
>>>  wrote:
>>>> http://www.infoq.com/news/2006/11/Office-UI-License
>>> [snip]
>>>
>>>> When asked if developers can implement ribbon-like
interfaces that work
>>>> differently but have the same underlying concept,
Microsoft has said no.
>>>> Microsoft has never before been this serious about
enforcing this level
>>>> of consistency before. Unlike past guidelines, mandatory
requirements
>>>> are legally mandatory according to the license agreement.
While they are
>>>> there specifically to ensure a minimum level of user
experience, some
>>>> developers are certain to dislike the idea of being forced
to abide by
>>>> the guidelines.
>>>>
>
>

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