Complaining about the Ribbon

"FH" wrote in message
...
I have suggestions for improvement, but I think such suggestions would fall
on deaf ears here. My feeling is that this is dangerous territory within
which to question the ribbon. I'm not looking for "get over it" replies.

I have now determined that you are rather bull-headed and intractable. Some
might call it stupid. You do not think.

If you have the time to spare, try downloading the Windows Media version of
this talk given by Jensen:
http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh/archiv...he-ribbon.aspx

I think that provides the most solid foundation for Microsoft's decision to
move away from menus and to a more (to me at least) intuitive Ribbon. It is
also fascinating.

--
Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]

Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375


After furious head scratching, FH asked:

| I have suggestions for improvement, but I think such suggestions
| would fall on deaf ears here. My feeling is that this is dangerous
| territory within which to question the ribbon. I'm not looking for
| "get over it" replies. I won't get over it. I will move on to
| different software. I am a fan of most of Microsoft's products and
| consider Office's feature set far superior to competition, so this is
| my last resort. What else can I do? The ribbon is simply a deal
| breaker for me. I've given it a shot, found it unacceptable, and have
| to make a decision. Productivity is what I am after, and ribbon
| doesn't deliver. Perhaps for some, but not for me. (I can't think of
| a more controversial decision Microsoft has made in recent years.)
|
| If you provide a link for MS's motivation to switch from the 2003
| interface to the ribbon, I will read it, but I can't read through all
| of Jenson's blog. Many have said the ribbon is better without
| providing a single reason why, save for vague things like usability
| (without naming why it supposedly improves usability). Thanks for
| providing the link to that, by the way. I'll try to contact him.
|
| "Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]" wrote:
|
|| 1. "After furious head scratching" is a part of my generic quote -
|| please feel free to review any of my thousands of other posts using
|| the same quote. It is not personal. I don't know you so why should
|| I make a personal comment just to you? Besides, I don't know of a
|| single other MVP who uses the same quoting style.
||
|| 2. The add-in I referred you to is free - no cost, nada, zilch,
|| nothing, completely usable without payment. If you want the full
|| program, you will need to pay. Microsoft is not taking any backward
|| steps on this. Their reasoning, while perhaps not acceptable to
|| some users, is well supported. See point number three.
||
|| 3. The only contact addresses that you will be able to use are the
|| generic ones that say "contact us" or something to that effect. No
|| one is going to give you a direct e-mail contact in Microsoft since
|| the GUI is not controlled by only one person. Even if I knew one,
|| which I don't, I don't work for Microsoft.
||
|| The one address that you can post a comment on is
|| http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh who was the chief architect of the
|| 2007 GUI. However, I don't know if that blog is currently being
|| monitored.
||
|| You might want to stop to read WHY the menu system was discontinued
|| as well to give some perpective about the change and why it was
|| inevitable.
||
|| 4. Have you reviewed the 2003--2007 tutorials that I posted the
|| link for?
||
|| Suggestions to improve the Ribbon will most likely be more
|| acceptable than a demand to return to what clearly would not work
|| going forward.
||
|| --
|| Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]
||
|| Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
|| How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375
||
||
|| After furious head scratching, FH asked:
||
||| While I appreciate the advice, I really am looking for contact email
||| addresses. Even a generic one. I know about the third party
||| utilities. I will not pay more for something that I think should be
||| included by default (the lite version of that program isn't as good
||| as I need it to be.)
|||
||| I have posted in the past here concerning the ribbon and I don't
||| think that it helps anyone to use the continuous ad-hominems you
||| MVP's like to throw around like "after frustrating head scratching."
||| Is it not possible that some people don't like ribbon for good
||| reasons? Ribbon-cheering will only make it worse (if something else
||| isn't there) and I think will hurt Microsoft as a company in the
||| long run. All of this looks very bad to me going forward,
||| especially since the ribbon-guy is working on the UI for W7, as I
||| understand it. You are blind if you think that there is not a
||| (rather large) contingent of people out there that do not have
||| *good* reasons for not-liking the ribbon. These people consider the
||| *ribbon* to be the kludgy interface.
|||
|||
|||
||| "Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]" wrote:
|||
|||| Office 2007 is out of development and I doubt they will do anything
|||| to revert to the old kludgy menu system. Office 14 will feature
|||| more applications with Ribboning (like the Outlook main window) to
|||| my understanding.
||||
|||| Even Windows will begin to use that interface.
||||
|||| I suggest that you either revert to Office 2003 or earlier or use
|||| the tutorials here to assist your learning curve:
||||
||
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/tr...CL100788241033
||||
|||| There are also add-ins that will revert Office 2007 to the earlier
|||| menu system - one free add-in is available from
|||| http://www.pschmid.net
||||
|||| --
|||| Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]
||||
|||| Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
|||| How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375
||||
||||
|||| After furious head scratching, FH asked:
||||
||||| I want to know where I can email the relevant office staff to
||||| suggest changes (i.e, bringing, or at least allowing, the 2003
||||| interface back). I could not find an email link for feature
||||| suggestions or commentary on the help page. I seriously cannot
||||| work with the Ribbon anymore. Today is the last day I will put up
||||| with it (At least at home... unfortunately, I don't have a choice
||||| when working with some clients, although luckily my firm has
||||| refused to adopt 2007 because of the ribbon.) I won't buy another
||||| Office product again that "features" it. The loss of productivity
||||| is still staggering, and I have been using it for at least 11
||||| months now. Office 2007 has a lot of great features I have come
||||| to love, but the ribbon is not one of them. I don't care if it's
||||| there - as long as the old menu is also there, too. I have a lot
||||| more things to say and arguments to make, but I'll save them for
||||| the relevant parties. If anyone knows the proper email
||||| address(es) to contact the Office 07 UI team - or at least
||||| someone who could pass along the message - please post.
|||||
|||||
||||| ----------------
||||| This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to
||||| the suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion,
||||| click the "I Agree" button in the message pane. If you do not see
||||| the button, follow this link to open the suggestion in the
||||| Microsoft Web-based Newsreader and then click "I Agree" in the
||||| message pane.
|||||
|||||
||||
||
http://www.microsoft.com/office/comm...ic.office.misc

You really must speak for yourself, Telstar, because you proved my point
exactly. First you erroneously say a feeling is meaningless, as if the term
could even be applied like that. What you of course meant to say is that the
effort is futile, but you obviously could not properly phrase it due to some
limitation on your part. Basically, you offered a "get over it" response. How
is that useful? It's not. Just like you - useless.

"Telstar" wrote:


"FH" wrote in message
...
I have suggestions for improvement, but I think such suggestions would fall
on deaf ears here. My feeling is that this is dangerous territory within
which to question the ribbon. I'm not looking for "get over it" replies.

I have now determined that you are rather bull-headed and intractable. Some
might call it stupid. You do not think.

I'll take a look at that, thanks.

"Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]" wrote:

If you have the time to spare, try downloading the Windows Media version of
this talk given by Jensen:
http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh/archiv...he-ribbon.aspx

I think that provides the most solid foundation for Microsoft's decision to
move away from menus and to a more (to me at least) intuitive Ribbon. It is
also fascinating.

--
Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]

Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375


After furious head scratching, FH asked:

| I have suggestions for improvement, but I think such suggestions
| would fall on deaf ears here. My feeling is that this is dangerous
| territory within which to question the ribbon. I'm not looking for
| "get over it" replies. I won't get over it. I will move on to
| different software. I am a fan of most of Microsoft's products and
| consider Office's feature set far superior to competition, so this is
| my last resort. What else can I do? The ribbon is simply a deal
| breaker for me. I've given it a shot, found it unacceptable, and have
| to make a decision. Productivity is what I am after, and ribbon
| doesn't deliver. Perhaps for some, but not for me. (I can't think of
| a more controversial decision Microsoft has made in recent years.)
|
| If you provide a link for MS's motivation to switch from the 2003
| interface to the ribbon, I will read it, but I can't read through all
| of Jenson's blog. Many have said the ribbon is better without
| providing a single reason why, save for vague things like usability
| (without naming why it supposedly improves usability). Thanks for
| providing the link to that, by the way. I'll try to contact him.
|
| "Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]" wrote:
|
|| 1. "After furious head scratching" is a part of my generic quote -
|| please feel free to review any of my thousands of other posts using
|| the same quote. It is not personal. I don't know you so why should
|| I make a personal comment just to you? Besides, I don't know of a
|| single other MVP who uses the same quoting style.
||
|| 2. The add-in I referred you to is free - no cost, nada, zilch,
|| nothing, completely usable without payment. If you want the full
|| program, you will need to pay. Microsoft is not taking any backward
|| steps on this. Their reasoning, while perhaps not acceptable to
|| some users, is well supported. See point number three.
||
|| 3. The only contact addresses that you will be able to use are the
|| generic ones that say "contact us" or something to that effect. No
|| one is going to give you a direct e-mail contact in Microsoft since
|| the GUI is not controlled by only one person. Even if I knew one,
|| which I don't, I don't work for Microsoft.
||
|| The one address that you can post a comment on is
|| http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh who was the chief architect of the
|| 2007 GUI. However, I don't know if that blog is currently being
|| monitored.
||
|| You might want to stop to read WHY the menu system was discontinued
|| as well to give some perpective about the change and why it was
|| inevitable.
||
|| 4. Have you reviewed the 2003--2007 tutorials that I posted the
|| link for?
||
|| Suggestions to improve the Ribbon will most likely be more
|| acceptable than a demand to return to what clearly would not work
|| going forward.
||
|| --
|| Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]
||
|| Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
|| How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375
||
||
|| After furious head scratching, FH asked:
||
||| While I appreciate the advice, I really am looking for contact email
||| addresses. Even a generic one. I know about the third party
||| utilities. I will not pay more for something that I think should be
||| included by default (the lite version of that program isn't as good
||| as I need it to be.)
|||
||| I have posted in the past here concerning the ribbon and I don't
||| think that it helps anyone to use the continuous ad-hominems you
||| MVP's like to throw around like "after frustrating head scratching."
||| Is it not possible that some people don't like ribbon for good
||| reasons? Ribbon-cheering will only make it worse (if something else
||| isn't there) and I think will hurt Microsoft as a company in the
||| long run. All of this looks very bad to me going forward,
||| especially since the ribbon-guy is working on the UI for W7, as I
||| understand it. You are blind if you think that there is not a
||| (rather large) contingent of people out there that do not have
||| *good* reasons for not-liking the ribbon. These people consider the
||| *ribbon* to be the kludgy interface.
|||
|||
|||
||| "Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]" wrote:
|||
|||| Office 2007 is out of development and I doubt they will do anything
|||| to revert to the old kludgy menu system. Office 14 will feature
|||| more applications with Ribboning (like the Outlook main window) to
|||| my understanding.
||||
|||| Even Windows will begin to use that interface.
||||
|||| I suggest that you either revert to Office 2003 or earlier or use
|||| the tutorials here to assist your learning curve:
||||
||
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/tr...CL100788241033
||||
|||| There are also add-ins that will revert Office 2007 to the earlier
|||| menu system - one free add-in is available from
|||| http://www.pschmid.net
||||
|||| --
|||| Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]
||||
|||| Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
|||| How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375
||||
||||
|||| After furious head scratching, FH asked:
||||
||||| I want to know where I can email the relevant office staff to
||||| suggest changes (i.e, bringing, or at least allowing, the 2003
||||| interface back). I could not find an email link for feature
||||| suggestions or commentary on the help page. I seriously cannot
||||| work with the Ribbon anymore. Today is the last day I will put up
||||| with it (At least at home... unfortunately, I don't have a choice
||||| when working with some clients, although luckily my firm has
||||| refused to adopt 2007 because of the ribbon.) I won't buy another
||||| Office product again that "features" it. The loss of productivity
||||| is still staggering, and I have been using it for at least 11
||||| months now. Office 2007 has a lot of great features I have come
||||| to love, but the ribbon is not one of them. I don't care if it's
||||| there - as long as the old menu is also there, too. I have a lot
||||| more things to say and arguments to make, but I'll save them for
||||| the relevant parties. If anyone knows the proper email
||||| address(es) to contact the Office 07 UI team - or at least
||||| someone who could pass along the message - please post.
|||||
|||||
||||| ----------------
||||| This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to
||||| the suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion,
||||| click the "I Agree" button in the message pane. If you do not see
||||| the button, follow this link to open the suggestion in the
||||| Microsoft Web-based Newsreader and then click "I Agree" in the
||||| message pane.
|||||
|||||
||||
||
http://www.microsoft.com/office/comm...ic.office.misc

"FH" wrote in message
...
You really must speak for yourself, Telstar, because you proved my point
exactly.

No.

First you erroneously say a feeling is meaningless, as if the term
could even be applied like that.

Absolutely. This is science, not feelings. Do you think they did not
consumer test this?

What you of course meant to say is that the
effort is futile, but you obviously could not properly phrase it due to
some
limitation on your part. Basically, you offered a "get over it" response.
How
is that useful? It's not. Just like you - useless.


Resistance is futile. Yes.

FH wrote...
Says who? Companies yield to pressure from consumers all the time. And I am
afraid you don't know what meaningless means.

Meaningless may have been an incorrect term. If the people who
thoroughly despise the new interface amount to less than 5% of all
Office users, then insignificant would have been more appropriate.

In a nutshell, Microsoft likely believes they face less effective
competition using the new interface than the old interface. If so,
your feelings, no matter how strongly or frequently expressed, won't
affect their decisions. No doubt they were figuring on some percentage
of Office users refusing to upgrade.

"Telstar" none@none wrote...
....
Absolutely. *This is science, not feelings. *Do you think they did not
consumer test this?

Evidently they didn't test the new UI with Excel users who had more
than a year of experience using Excel pre-ribbon. The wide majority
opinion in the Excel newsgroups is that the ribbon sucks, and there
are many detailed critiques on Excel-specific websites and in the
newsgroups on how the new & improved interface makes Excel
demonstrably harder to use.

The ribbon is a fine example of an interface that may make some sense
for Word being imposed on other Office programs whether or not it
makes sense for those other programs.

Resistance is futile. *Yes.

Possibly, but avoidance isn't. Time to give OpenOffice a look.

"Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]" what@ever wrote...
If you have the time to spare, try downloading the Windows Media version of
this talk given by Jensen:http://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh/archiv...ory-of-the-rib...
....

And it's almost all about Word, with only a slide or two for the other
Office programs.

"Harlan Grove" wrote in message
:

"Telstar" none@none wrote...
Resistance is futile. Yes.

Possibly, but avoidance isn't. Time to give OpenOffice a look.

People who hate the Ribbon say that a lot, and yet they still spend week
after week, month after month here in this newsgroup complaining about
the Ribbon.

Instead of over in the OpenOffice newsgroups complaining about why
OpenOffice Calc doesn't cleanly open all of their Excel files. :-)


-Ben-
Ben M. Schorr, MVP
Roland Schorr & Tower
http://www.rolandschorr.com
http://www.officeforlawyers.com
Author - The Lawyer's Guide to Microsoft Outlook 2007:
http://tinyurl.com/5m3f5q

Telstar, you are hopeless. You have no idea of what you are talking about.
You have some deep inherent confusion that I won't take the trouble to tear
out, but that is clearly borne out by your contradictory, incoherent rambles.
Every time you post, you dig your own hole (of unreason) deeper. Either you
are a troll, or just a very confused individual (or both). In any case, as I
stated previously, I have no intention of arguing with people like you, so
I'll let you get back under your bridge.

"Telstar" wrote:


"FH" wrote in message
...
You really must speak for yourself, Telstar, because you proved my point
exactly.

No.

First you erroneously say a feeling is meaningless, as if the term
could even be applied like that.

Absolutely. This is science, not feelings. Do you think they did not
consumer test this?

What you of course meant to say is that the
effort is futile, but you obviously could not properly phrase it due to
some
limitation on your part. Basically, you offered a "get over it" response.
How
is that useful? It's not. Just like you - useless.


Resistance is futile. Yes.