Office 2007 UI a disaster

[Z4MC]

In this my first post as a heavy buyer and user of Miscrosoft software I have to say that Office 2007 is not a total disaster but it is inthe catoegory of "what were they thinking".

Fist of all I like the big icon concept- yes Apple was there first of course but no problem better late than never- and yes I know you can make a small ribbon bar and put anything that you want in it- but it is an afterthought - the large icon ribbons is the major change and focus fof the new UI. Microsoft has advertised and played up the large icon UI so they pbviously think it is worthwhile.

And I wont nitpick that Outlook, without its "older" ribbon bar and dismal slowness (Mark Cuban says memry hole I am not so sure about that but...) looks like the team that programmed it missed the OFFICE 2007 team meetings. Anyway...

But what does EVERYONE do everytime they open a document in Office? They SAVE it , they PRINT it or they EMAIL it. Is it just me or shouldnt these 3 BIG icons be prominent in the MAIN ribbon bar instead of that silly office circle in the upper left and then dragging down then across just to print. Really this is just stupid with all the large icons. And then in word I have 5 large icons to change styles- MOST business users (maybe 90%) NEVER change a style why isnt that space reserved for the three MOST important icons that EVERYONE uses?

Am I missing something here? Shuldnt I be able to one click on a LARGE easy to use Icon? If larger icons arent easeir to use them Apple wouldnt have done them in the first place and Microsoft wouldnt have copied them.

And while I am at it why not a "roll your own" Ribbon where I can make 10-15 of the most used LARGE icons that I USE

Now THAT would be innovation- not having to use the app like some focus groups of desingers at MS THINK how i would/should use the app. Would be cool to click a "MINE" on the tool bar and my customized ribbon of large icons is right there for me. Now THAT would be worth my $300 they want for office.

And yes maybe editing some XML of VB script may make this happen but for the 99% of us that just want o use the app and not recreate anthing like that- MS should have done this from the start.

I am putting my asbestos on now

[PC_LOAD_LETTER]

OK first off, I'm not falling for your 'Apple is the better cuz tehy has teh big iconz 1st LOL' flamebait tactics (I know thats not what you typed but thats the way I read it) -dammit! fell for it again!

Secondly I have a couple hundred people i've deployed office 2007 to and while some are more vocal than others, I can tell you that almost everyone hates it for around a month then after working a bit with it i hear things like 'I was doing X in (Word, Excel, Powerpoint) the other day and it did the coolest thing! Did it have that feature in 2003?" to which I get reply "no it didn't" they there is much rejoicing and they all thank me for the time I took Update and deploy Office 2007 to all of them (ok that last part is made up but you get the point) Short Version: 90% of the people i have upgraded hated it for the first month. After that they had adjusted to it and adapted. I've even told them we were maintaining a 2003 license for at least a year and offered anyone that wanted to the option to go back for year and so far I've only had 1 taker (who will likely retire before that time)

[sam13484]

"and it did the coolest thing"

Can you give us some examples of these cool things that Office 2003, or for that matter Office 2000, can't do? For the average user, which includes most of us, Office 2007 gave us nothing in the way of real improvements. Sure, the Ribbon was a different approach, but they should have made it smaller, and like the OP said, included the most used functions on the Ribbon, and not as a drop down menu. I thought the whole point of the Ribbon was to eliminate that kind of stuff.

I was hoping for some UI changes with SP1, but we got nothing. Even a few addition color schemes would have been nice; maybe something that didn't look like a child's typing program. What was wrong with the original Office 2000 grey color scheme?

I understand that this whole thread is kind of useless. Supporters of MS will always paint their products in the best possible light, and MS, itself, has a well documented history of never listening to its own user base.

By the way, I'm still running Office 2000.

[PC_LOAD_LETTER]

"and it did the coolest thing"

Can you give us some examples of these cool things that Office 2003, or for that matter Office 2000, can't do?

Nothing groundbreaking or anything usually its just little stuff like the font face/size/style changing when you hover it in the list, the little formatting 'swatches' things, I have several departments using Groove (which is actually a decent app)

point was that people in my enviroment are adapting well to 2007

I like the fact that outlook is set to authenticating outgoing email servers by default (its about time)

I do not like the lack of slipstreaming updates (though the Updates folder is an awesome idea -i love the /admin switch)

[spacesurfer]

The programmability of the ribbon is much more extensive than it seems on the surface with callback. Although I'm not a programmer, I've changed the ribbon to suite my needs. See link below for customizing your ribbon. I got rid of the styles that you are talking about. And I created my own new tab.

Also, the print, save, print preview, email, etc. can be put on the mini toolbar (at the top) easily IF you look for customizing it. Anything can be put on the mini toolbar at the top.

It is only YOUR opinion that you don't like the ribbon. It took me but a week to get used to it and realize I can find things faster with the ribbon than the old 2003, especially in Access 2007. Access 2007 is much much improved over 2003.

Anyway, this forum is to GET HELP, not rant about what you like and dislike.

Oh yeah, I wouldn't call it a "disaster", call it a "resistance to change".

Edited December 17, 2007 by spacesurfer

[Z4MC]

The programmability of the ribbon is much more extensive than it seems on the surface with callback. Although I'm not a programmer, I've changed the ribbon to suite my needs. See link below for customizing your ribbon. I got rid of the styles that you are talking about. And I created my own new tab.

Also, the print, save, print preview, email, etc. can be put on the mini toolbar (at the top) easily IF you look for customizing it. Anything can be put on the mini toolbar at the top.

It is only YOUR opinion that you don't like the ribbon. It took me but a week to get used to it and realize I can find things faster with the ribbon than the old 2003, especially in Access 2007. Access 2007 is much much improved over 2003.

Anyway, this forum is to GET HELP, not rant about what you like and dislike.

Oh yeah, I wouldn't call it a "disaster", call it a "resistance to change".

Its not that I havent gotten "used" to it I was used to it after 1 day. And I have an extensive mini bar that I have customized but my point is that MS has agreed with Apple that BIG ICONS ARE EASIER TO USE than smaller ones- on a phone, on an PC in the office , in a touchscreen on a car it doesnt matter- bigger is easier to use. I own a company- we write software for the food processingindustry- bigger icons on scanners are better- bigger icons in our managmenet console are better- but ESPECIALLY in an app like MS Office - THE app of apps. WHY did they leave the MOST important ones on a "mini" bar?

Sorry about the rant thought someone had an answer to make the print, save and email icons larger

Edited December 17, 2007 by Z4MC

[spacesurfer]

It's impossible to please everyone. You may deem print, email, save important vs someone else.

Use my link to customizing the ribbon to add those buttons. It shouldn't be that hard to accomplish just that.

I do admit that MS made programming the ribbon extremely hard.

[ramik]

I have just discovered this addon for Office 2007, which gives you back old classical Office 2007 toolbars and menus:

http://www.addintools.com/english/menuoffice/default.htm

but it is not free, costs $30 ....

[spacesurfer]

It's been posted here before.

All it does is add a tab called Menus. It's actually a modified ribbon with a Menu tab that has the familiar 2003 toolbar buttons.

It's a nice concept for those learning the new and still need the old. It probably has an option to remove the other tabs and keep only the menu tab.

[ramik]

It's a nice concept for those learning the new and still need the old. It probably has an option to remove the other tabs and keep only the menu tab.

yes, it has this option, but only for the default main tabs, the contect tabs (table layout when you select a table and the others) will still be shown.

update: I even got a free registration code from them because i fixed the italian translation of the interface

[spacesurfer]

You can actually make your own menu tab to look like office 2003 toolbar if you are willing to spend a bit of time -- lots of time.

I don't know how it's done for excel and powerpoint but I know how for word.

for word, normal.dotm is used. I'm not sure what's used for excel and powerpoint.

[tain]

You can actually make your own menu tab to look like office 2003 toolbar if you are willing to spend a bit of time -- lots of time.

I don't know how it's done for excel and powerpoint but I know how for word.

for word, normal.dotm is used. I'm not sure what's used for excel and powerpoint.

Sounds like something that someone could create and share with everyone

[war59312]

Well, I love the classic menus but sadly it causes Powerpoint to crash instead of close. Have yet to hear back from tech support, been a few days...

Edited December 20, 2007 by war59312

[spacesurfer]

Creating the 2003 toolbar buttons wouldn't take too long but creating the 2003 menus (file, edit, insert, etc) would take forever. It's a daunting task.

Maybe if I have free time, who knows...

[leadboots5]

you could try this out if you willing to pay...

http://www.addintools.com/english/menuoffice/default.htm