InsideMicrosoft

Microsoft Office 2007 UI: Now Named “Fluent”; Verdict: Blech!

Microsoft appears to have settled on a product name for Office 2007’s landmark user interface: “Fluent”. Officially, the “Microsoft® Office Fluent™ user interface” is the name that will be used for the Ribbon interface that we have come to know in a year of testing Office 2007, a name that just screams “Why bother?” The internet is littered with praise for the Ribbon UI, journalists are talking about the Ribbon in great ways, everyone familiar with Office 2007 is familiar with the name Ribbon, so naturally, they have to change it.

I’ve noticed a growing problem in big corporations: People who feel like they have to do their job, when their influence will only negatively affect whatever they are butting in on. You see this all the time with lawyers, who, despite any chance of actual legal or financial problems for a company, will jump in and threaten someone or try to stop something, creating a problem where none existed. I understand Microsoft has people whose job it is to create brands that will resonate with consumers, and those people don’t like the idea that some engineer or UI designer came up with the name “Ribbon”, so they had to reinvent it.

Someone with some authority, step in and put the kibosh on this move. “Ribbon” works, and has a ton of great karma, so don’t blow it with some bull like “Fluent”.

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Bonus items:

Microsoft is currently developing a plug-in, called “Scout”, for Office 2007 that adds a new tab: Search Commands. When you need to find an option and have no clue where it would belong in the Office interface, or if you just love keyboard navigation, you can enter the name of a command in the search box and the rest of the Ribbon tab will fill with buttons for features that match what you typed. It appears similar to how the Start menu works in Windows Vista, you just start typing and results appear, although as a bunch of big graphics, and you can hit a number to launch a specific feature.

This looks like a great addition to Office 2007, the sort of thing that should be included as an option in Office setup. Thankfully, it looks like it will be a free download. With Save as PDF/XPS and Scout, we are closing in on a great pack of required add-ons for Office.

Also, Microsoft is pilot testing a program that will give referral bonuses to computers that ship with the Office 2007 trial software installed, if the buyer decides to pay to turn the trial into a full version. This is a great incentive for manufacturers to bundle Office, shipping it on new PCs (without adding to the cost of the PC) and letting the buyer decide what to do with it. If the buyer goes for Office (and many will), the manufacturer gets a cut, and if the buyer doesn’t, they can go towards one of the free/open source office suites out there.

January 29th, 2007 Posted by Nathan Weinberg | Office, Applications, General | one comment