Submission details
Keep the title bar for Ribbon apps clean
While I love the Ribbon in Office 2007 I never understood why they have put the Quick Access bar on the title bar. In Win7's Paint and Wordpad there is even more space available to the right side. Putting too many elements into the top left corner makes the ui look cluttered.
The title bar should only have window controls on it, not buttons for the app. The new "File" menu and the tabs should be something like a taskbar for the app: The Orb is the start menu, then there is a customizable Quick Lauch/Access and finaly the tabs are for switching different tasks.
Medium
Medium
Not fixed
Discussion (18 comments)
Well i would like a mix of the first and the third. Overall I don't like the blue button next to the ribbon tabs because it's color is terrible and doesn't fit to the rest. So do it as it was in Office 2007 or as it is in the 3rd concept.
But I also like the idea of putting important buttons like saving etc into the title bar. The title bar has enough space and this has to be used! So I'd like to have it as it already is!
Your concepts aren't that great since they remove the predictability of where things in the UI lie: If you add a Button to your quick access bar, the tabs would move which would also make your remembered position of the tabs useless until you remember the new position again...
I'd like to see the orb for each application that uses the ribbon but I'd love to see the quick-access bar and the optional tabs unchanged from the office concept.
^ agree. The orb (should be round btw) should have the app icon. Make something to tell people that the orb can be used for something. such as a first time run bloon. The bloon will only show the first time you run the app, a yellow or orange glow or somethhing.
I like a combo of 1st & 3rd
1st concept with 3rd concept's larger icon with a small down arrow (indication of being a menu) would be ideal!
I think the command grouping on ribbon needs to be like Office 2007 as well.
I think (as in google chrome & office 2k7) there should be (only) some important icons on the titlebar... it's nice feature. Otherwise not using it is a waste of space
Bad idea especially NOW, when Microsoft tries to show interest in ergonomics and muscle memory. Shitfing the ribbon "tabs" whenever you add to quick access contradicts the entire idea.
I guess you weren't paying much attention to Jensen Harris' blog and PDC 2008 keynotes!
@Jote: Sure I have. And I know that he argued with Fitt's Law here. For an complex app like Office this may be right but who really runs Wordpad or Paint in full screen?
Please let me add this: I really think that it may be an really bad idea to let third party developers placing buttons on the window frame.
@tino: agreed! Let's not start letting people put junk on the titlebar
Also down with combo of first and third.
haha.
I would love to see these "studies" and that doesn't mean create some ramrod chart in excel.
+1 to this. A mix of the 1st with the 3rd concept would be nice. It's far better looking, less effort to click the orb, and it would remove centering problems.
The orb would be nice, though I love the icons on the title bar.
+1 for the 3rd concept!
+1 for the clean titlebar (I don't like these orbs)
The orbs were alright. I just don't get what was so hard to understand about them. After all the start button is an orb!
-1
I like it the way it is now.
DavidTaraso wrote on November 3, 2008, 5:06pm
Wow, I really like that 3rd concept. But I think it would be best if the Save, Undo and Redo buttons went to the other end of the tab bar, next to the Help icon.