#1 − Nice features
Marc –
i already had a look to this movie some months ago. my first impression was “oh, looks nice but will it be usefull?”. after some thinking about it i would like to get this new version asap. think this ideas will be interesting for other applications as well.
the “bad thing” is that microsoft once more did their own thing for the toolbar-system. now, where they are shiping their current toolbar-system with .net 2.0 they just started to use another system once more so component-writers can do business once copy the microsoft style. the race is started once more :-)
cheers, marc
#2 − Just tested it!
I just tried it out and am still very excited about it. Both PowerPoint and Word are worlds better than any previous versions.
Kind of … the toolbar is actually a whole area on which any controls can be laid. The “ribbon” really only works for applications with a lot of functionality and a lot of different workflows. It also only works once a lot of time has been put into researching how people want to use the program.
Many other applications—including those condsidering using the “cool new” toolbar from Microsoft—will have far less success than they expect. Even if they manage to replicate the look and feel, they won’t be able to replicate the usability with a simple copycat approach. That said, I do hope they at least make the toolkit available so that applications that do want to make the leap to using a “ribbon” can do so in a standard way.