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Windows 7 -- ribbons for everyone!
CWuestefeld:
Mouser will like this, I guess:
E-mail, photo programs stripped from Windows 7
Microsoft has decided that Windows 7 won't include built-in programs for e-mail, photo editing, and movie making, as was done with Windows Vista, CNET News.com has learned.
The software maker included Windows Photo Gallery, Windows Mail, and Windows Movie Maker as part of Vista, but later chose to offer separate downloadable Windows Live programs that essentially replaced those components with versions that could connect to online services from Microsoft and others.
Microsoft told CNET News late Monday that it has decided to remove those features entirely from Windows 7 and instead offer only the service-connected Windows Live versions as optional free downloads.
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Paul Keith:
Hmm... I don't use FARR but this sounds interesting. Care to elaborate?
-Paul Keith (September 23, 2008, 09:35 PM)
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I'll let others elaborate for me :P
-Lashiec (September 24, 2008, 07:58 AM)
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Thanks! In the words of Carol:
Wow! That's brilliant - probably better than the 2007 ribbon or 2003 toolbars !
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Now this is what everyone needs! ;D
Carol Haynes:
Yep - and I still think so - whenever I can't find something I use it and it finds it quickly and reminds me where to find it next time and the shortcut.
JohnFredC:
Johnny-come-lately here, but...
There are so may reasons the ribbon is bad GUI it's hard to find a place to begin. Maybe I'll write an in-depth post some day. It's not about resistance to change, or the newbie vs. experience dichotomy. It's simply about poor attention to human factors.
For one perspective, consider that toolbar/ribbon icons are targets for mouse movement... almost like ducks in an arcade shooter game. Which is easier to locate and hit... one duck in a (one-degree of freedom) row of ducks (aka toolbar) or one duck in a crowd (two-degrees of freedom) of similar ducks (aka "ribbon")?
The ribbon slows your targeting down by requiring additional cognition (and additional clicking compared to a toolbar or menu: try both methods and count your clicks) to find the tool you need, then makes it more difficult to actually hit that icon by crowding other icons into the circle of confusion for mouse movement, increasing the chances you'll click the wrong icon by accident.
The most aggravating thing is that MS completely abandoned what I considered the best toolbar metaphor around: the Office toolbar system. It's insulting that they didn't offer the ribbon as an alternative, but instead it is a total replacement for something many of us have habituated for years and liked! They said: all of you loyal users (such as myself) who have been buying office for 2 decades because of its excellence: screw you. You don't matter. You don't know anything about your own productivity. Custom toolbars? Who needs those? We don't, therefore you don't.
And the funny irony is that even Microsoft itself calls the one remaining toolbar in Office the "quick access" toolbar.
Sorry about the rant.
Carol Haynes:
The ribbon slows your targeting down by requiring additional cognition (and additional clicking compared to a toolbar or menu: try both methods and count your clicks) to find the tool you need, then makes it more difficult to actually hit that icon by crowding other icons into the circle of confusion for mouse movement, increasing the chances you'll click the wrong icon by accident.
-JohnFredC (October 08, 2008, 11:12 AM)
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Actually I disagree -the advantage (to me anyway) of the ribbon is that the icons are much larger than the previous toolbar icons and are therefore much easier to hit without having to be nearly so accurate. I also like the fact that hovering over an icon shows you what will actually happen in the document without making the change until you click. Personally I prefer the tabbed interface of the ribbon to the plethora of toolbars in previous versions which in terms of screen real estate meant you had to keep most of them hidden. It is much quicker to click a visible tab and then the large icon than right click on a blank bit of toolbar area, find the toolbar you want, click on it, then find the toolbar wherever it happens to be since the previous use and then find the tiny icon you wanted.
The places I will agree are that the ribbon doesn't contain enough information which means that it takes a while to learn where everything is. It is also irritating that some features from previous versions are still present but not in the ribbon - so there is no obvious way to find them apart from remembering keybard shortcuts - search command addin goes a long way to solving that issue. And I do agree that the ribbon should be option so you can choose your interface - given that third party addins can provide this I can't see why MS can't provide a free addin to do the job on their own website.
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