Lots of reasons to dislike Microsoft, to be sure, and to distrust
them as well.
Still, I've been looking in greater depth at the new Office UI and
thinking about it and I think that for most users who care about
results -- the what and not the how -- this new approach to the user
experience is going to be VERY well received even if it doesn't get
everything quite right -- or even close.
I've ALWAYS detested cascading menus and in Office, there are a lot
of things you can't do without them. I also not-infrequently pause
and puzzle over which menu in a given menubar -- not just in Office
but in lots of apps -- is likely to be hiding the choice I really
want. With the new approach, functionality that users could logically
be expected to look for in two or more places can just be placed on
two or more of those palette thingies that appear when the user
clicks on a command tab.
I really think that although there are certainly flaws in this
design, the general approach is sensible and bold. I'm not delighted
that it's Microsoft thinking but there's another aspect to it that I
like: it's the *concept* of the command tab and the resultant
revelation of a command panel that users will become used to, not so
much the specific commands or elements contained in those panels or
their appearance or arrangement. And I think that means there's lots
of room to build on the MS concept.
ALso, it IS clear from the description that the old dialog box/sheet
approach will still be available. I think the idea of having the
document appearance change dynamically as you mouse over the icons
for the design changes is a real coding challenge but could make
users much less prone to making dumb design decisions.
All in all, I'm feeling surprisingly favorable toward it.
Of course, I still hate the company. Goes without saying, I suppose.
On Oct 10, 2005, at 9:39 PM, Judy Perry wrote:
Sounds like even more 'Death by PowerPoint' ...
Of course users want to be told how things should look.
But your point is well taken re: reading the originals.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dan Shafer, Information Product Consultant and Author
http://www.shafermedia.com
Get my book, "Revolution: Software at the Speed of Thought"
From http://www.shafermediastore.com/tech_main.html
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