Login:
Password:
Lost Password?
Print this article  |  E-mail this article  |  Comment on this article

Microsoft Tweaks Office 2007 UI

By Ed Oswald, BetaNews

August 25, 2006, 11:58 AM

After receiving complaints from testers, Microsoft has decided to make changes to the user interface of Office 2007 in the next refresh of the beta of the productivity suite. The change would come to the "ribbon," Office 2007's replacement for standard drop-down menus.

Microsoft says the new menu system would make the various features easier to locate. In an interview last September, the company told BetaNews that a majority of users were requesting features that were already included in Office. The most current release includes some 1,500 commands.

The sheer number of commands meant that the drop-down menu system was no longer viable, which led the company to create the Office 2007 ribbon. However, testers complained that it took up so much space. To correct this, Microsoft will now make the detailed portion of the ribbon auto-hide when not in use.

Also being added in the next Office 2007 update is the so called "super tooltip" to describe each group of commands in the ribbon. In current releases, only the individual commands use the larger tooltips. It is likely being added here due to the auto-hide feature.

Additionally, the company has decided to rework the Start-like menu found in the upper-left hand corner, now calling it the "Office" menu. Microsoft also said work continues on automatic migration programs that would translate documents from the old Office format to the new XML-based format being used in Office 2007.

The changes were announced during a presentation held at TechEd 2006 Australia in Sydney.

Add a Comment (27 Comments)

BetaNews reserves the right to remove any comment at any time for any reason. Please keep your responses appropriate and on topic. Foul language and personal attacks will not be tolerated.

Name (required):

E-mail (required):

Enter Your Comment:

By batteryfast

posted Nov 10, 2008 - 10:12 PM

Also being added in the next Office 2007 update is the so called "super tooltip" to describe each group of commands in the ribbon. In current releases, only the individual commands use the larger tooltips. It is likely being added here due to the auto-hide feature.

Additionally, the company has decided to rework the Start-like menu found in the upper-left hand corner, now calling it the "Office" menu. Microsoft also said work continues on automatic hp m2000 battery hp dv1000 battery hp dv4000 battery migration programs that would translate documents from the old Office format to the new XML-based format being used in Office 2007.

Score: 0

By dydavid

edited Aug 27, 2006 - 1:24 AM

MS - put a transition menu system together for current users. Similar to WordPerfect transition menu. That way commands already familiar could stay that way.

Excel also has a Lotus 123 transition menu. Same thing.

We have all put in hundreds of hours getting familiar with Office. Don't confuse users with too much new information w/o a transition.

Score: 0

By citizen420

posted Aug 28, 2006 - 5:06 PM

Word/DOS was not even worth mentioning
Word 95 was crappest
Office 2001 was crapper
Office XP was crap
Office 2003 pro was OK
Office 2007 is crap
Office 201* is gonna be crapper

The way i see it office is degrading again after 2003, so the only sane solution is to switch to a far superior alternative....

OpenOffice.org!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Score: 0

By morriscox

posted Aug 29, 2006 - 10:17 AM

I find it interesting that your highest opinion is of the software you seem to have used the most. I wonder if your opinion would change with more experience with Office 2007.

Score: 0

By dhjdhj

posted Aug 27, 2006 - 2:09 AM

Office XP was fine
Office 2001 was fine
Word 95 was fine
Word/DOS was fine

Darned if I can see why we need yet another iteration!

Score: 0

By morriscox

posted Aug 28, 2006 - 10:21 AM

If Word/DOS was fine, then why did you try any other versions and why aren't you using it now?

Score: 0

By KSzostek

posted Aug 28, 2006 - 10:12 AM

Have you even tried 07?

Score: 0

By treworld

posted Aug 26, 2006 - 9:16 AM

This Office 2007 interface looks like it was designed for children. It is unprofessional and should be redesigned. They slim it down for the "Professional" version and leave it as is for the "School & Teacher" edition.

Score: 0

By school1012

posted Aug 27, 2006 - 11:03 AM

Actually several bussines that I deal with like the new design. They say they can find feature faster

Score: 0

By KSzostek

posted Aug 28, 2006 - 10:09 AM

My company also likes the new design. Microsoft did a great job on it.

Score: 0

By zridling

posted Aug 26, 2006 - 12:07 AM

Here are direct visual comparisons between the ribbon and toolbar. The ribbon is 47 pixels larger than the Office 2003 toolbar and menu.

Also, what's up with the UGLY obtrusive keyboard shortcuts? Were underlined letters too much? Oh that's right, when you go from text to pretty little crayon pictures...

Score: 0

By IOMO

posted Aug 29, 2006 - 6:30 AM

Too much uneccessary padding all over the place and too many text/icon combinations. If the icons are clear enough you shouldn't need the text, you've got tooltips for that.

Score: 0

By morriscox

posted Aug 28, 2006 - 10:36 AM

No thanks. I don't bother with pages that are laced with profanity.

Score: 0

By cranbers

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 8:16 PM

I have an idea, how about they have a menu that can be changed to the user's desire. You know, do you want to use the old school or the new forced upon school? I like the new office, they finally did something useful with it, however forcing changes as drastic as that isn't ok. I have no doubt 2007 will bomb, office 2003 offers everything most users need, heck 97 did that. If you use 97 after using 2003, you will dislike it, however it does what you need. Even openoffice.org is fine for most users, just not having microsoft's ui touches will be meaningless soon enough.

Score: 0

By KSzostek

posted Aug 28, 2006 - 10:10 AM

Not really.

Score: 0

By The MAZZTer

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 5:57 PM

"Additionally, the company has decided to rework the Start-like menu found in the upper-left hand corner, now calling it the "Office" menu."

Ummm it's been called that for months now, ever since the public beta was released at LEAST.

Score: 0

By drumcat

edited Aug 25, 2006 - 4:45 PM

Amen, guys. I don't know who they're asking about this stuff. They need to ask people what they think AFTER they've used it 40 hours, not "here it is, what do you think?" It shows that while usability is key for them, they're being skiddish in how they approach new items. Hopefully someone over in Building 36 grows some juevos...

Score: 0

By zridling

posted Aug 26, 2006 - 12:23 AM

Here was a typical response between long-time users in the newsgroups and Microsoft "test drive" interactive feedback button, the response was overwhelmingly negative. At 47 pixels larger than the 2003 bar, it took up a full quarter of the page space.

I use Word and Excel to be productive. If I've got a huge picture toolbar/ribbon there, it's merely in the way. This is word processing for 1st graders instead of people who can actually type.

Score: 0

By Grazer

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 5:47 PM

They need to ask people what they think AFTER they've used it 40 hours...

I think they did, that is why they are changing it.

Score: 0

By ErikR1968

edited Aug 25, 2006 - 4:04 PM

The office Clipboard is still available in Office 2007.

In Word, on the Home Tab, simply click the word "Clipboard" in the first section of the ribbon. :)

Score: 0

By sural98

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 2:13 PM

If I am not mistaken Office Clipboard is not available in 2007 version.
At least I could not locate it since classical menu system is no longer in use. I tried Ctrl+C+C option but it did not worked.
If MS thinks of including this option in this version the no of collected items can be more than 24.
And I wonder if MS thinks of integrating Office clipboard into IE 7 since we are in need of collecting items from Office apps to paste into web forms.

Score: 0

By mshulman

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 12:20 PM

At first I wasn't so sure about the ribbon, but now I like it. I don't think it takes up that much space either - maybe if you are running at 640x480, but who does that anymore?

Score: 0

By school1012

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 12:56 PM

Did you know that you can double click on the tab name, and it will hide the tabs?

Score: 0

By Jordanr05

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 1:00 PM

I did not know that - that's really convienant. I guess on top of that we'll have the option to auto-hide it now. Not really a big change when you think about it.

Score: 0

By asrope

edited Aug 25, 2006 - 12:38 PM

I'm with mshulman,now that I'm used to the ribbon I really like it. It is so much easier to find and format items.

Score: 0

By bwerner

edited Aug 25, 2006 - 2:45 PM

I'm with you all too. At first it was a bit different, but now I love the ribbon, and it really doesn't take up much room, who uses much less than a 17 or 19in screen anymore anyways?

Thanks for the double click tip - :)

Score: 0

By billtheitguy

posted Aug 25, 2006 - 11:52 PM

I use a laptop with 15" wide screen LCD in 1280 X 800 res. The ribbon took up a lot of realestate. I like the auto-hide and would love more hot keys for font formating also.

Score: 0

Nov 21 - 9:29 PM ET Hurd's the word in Ballmer's e-mail nightmares

Nov 21 - 6:51 PM ET Coalition urges better laws for e-mail and cell phone privacy

Nov 21 - 6:42 PM ET How is Internet advertising faring in this bad economy?

Nov 21 - 6:15 PM ET From out of the Amazon Cloud, an AWS winner emerges

Nov 21 - 5:20 PM ET Mufin music finder enters public beta, adds widgets

Nov 21 - 5:01 PM ET Google launches its SearchWiki semantics plug-in

Nov 21 - 4:57 PM ET Asus previews a slimmer, less costly Eee PC

Nov 21 - 4:32 PM ET New Adobe Media Player ushers in AIR 1.5

Nov 21 - 2:11 PM ET AT&T to add Pantech's low-cost C630 phone to 3G lineup

Nov 21 - 1:11 PM ET iPhone gets firmware 2.2 update