Licensing Microsoft's Ribbon UI

Posted @ 9:15AM

Categories: General

A little over a year ago I blogged about getting Microsoft to provide access to the new ribbon UI available in Office 2007 and just recently they've announced a licensing agreement. While I would prefer to see MS make their implementation available like the existing common controls this seems like a fairly reasonable exchange. Reading Jensen Harris' blog it seems that developer request help make the different in getting this pushed through. Thanks Jensen for getting the word out!

Update: Here is a video of Jensen discussing this announcement.

Comments [6]

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Wednesday, November 22, 2006 9:46:05 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Interesting commentary on this can be found on Mike Gunderloy's Daily Grind (http://www.larkware.com/dg7/TheDailyGrind1019.aspx) about this. What's doubly interesting about it is that he cites a Borland lawsuit as reasons why it's not a good idea.

(It also appears that your blog doesn't support comments being entered when viewed through FeedDemon. Prior to entering this through IE, I've tried unsuccessfully twice in the past to comment and it never takes or gives any meaningful error.)

Mike Simons

Wednesday, November 22, 2006 9:49:58 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Hi Mike,
I too read The Daily Grind, great stuff. I think it will certainly be interesting to see how all this settles out. I believe MS is likely just trying to protect their Office business from things like OpenOffice or perhaps even web based implementations.

Thanks for letting me know about the FeedDemon issue. I was unaware of that until you mentioned it and I'll investigate it. I'm not a FeedDemon user but according to my FeedBurner.com stats it's the #1 reader used for my site.

-Steve

Steve Trefethen

Wednesday, November 22, 2006 1:17:17 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

I work for NewsGator in technical support.

I'm posting a reply from within FeedDemon right now to test the problem that Mike is reporting.

I'm currently using IE6, but I'll test again with IE7 if this goes through normally. (So sorry in advance for the apparent comment spam.)

Jack Brewster
Technical Support
NewsGator Technologies

Jack Brewster

Wednesday, November 22, 2006 1:20:54 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Looks like IE6 worked just fine, so here's an IE7 test.

Jack Brewster

Wednesday, November 22, 2006 1:21:59 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Both IE versions are working so it doesn't appear to be a FeedDemon specific problem as far as I can tell.

I have seen problems posting comments from within FeedDemon when using the unsupported ActiveX Mozilla Control. But that option is no longer supported in FeedDemon 2.1 and I'm not sure if it's applicable here.

(last post :) )

Jack Brewster

Thursday, November 23, 2006 12:22:39 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

I doubt Microsoft is going to take action against anyone using their Ribbon Bars and getting it wrong, unless they compete with them, i.e. OpenOffice or Corel.

Oliver Townshned

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