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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