On the Ribbon...

Let me start by saying I appreciate all of the feedback that everyone has been throwing my way on the "Share Me" post from a few days ago.  Much of the feedback has centered on the new "Ribbon" interface which is shown in a screenshot in my post. 

One of the challenges that comes from blogging about yet-to-be-released software is that you can't always show the "latest and greatest" UI or functionality until certain points during the release schedule. The screenshots I showed were from Beta 1 (which was several months ago) and used old versions of the Ribbon, the old RSS icon, and several other parts of the old compose Sharing Message. 

The Ribbon interface is part of the new Office 2007 UI that Jensen Harris, PM on the User Experience team for Office, has been blogging about for several months now. 

Jensen's blog is a great read on the design, implementation, and feedback of the new Ribbon interface and its span across all of the applications in the Office 2007 suite. This link is a collection of the posts Jensen wrote in a series that explains why the Ribbon is in Office 2007: https://blogs.msdn.com/jensenh/archive/category/11720.aspx. 

I strongly encourage everyone who provided feedback on the Ribbon to give Jensen's blog a read. It has great detail and provides a ton of screenshots that offer context for all the UI elements. As the next few months roll by, you can expect to see the latest and greatest Ribbon iterations in our Beta 2 builds.

Again, thanks for all of the feedback and for keeping up with my blog.