Using the New User Interface
If you’ve been working with Beta 1 of the 2007 Microsoft Office system or if you read any of the press coverage or blog posts about the new release, you’ve heard about the new user interface, which is the dramatic new replacement for the customary menu system in previous versions of Microsoft Office. The user interface stretches across the top of the work area in most of the core applications, giving you tabs, contextual commands, and more that are related to the current operation you are performing (see Figure 2-1).
Figure 2-1. The user interface includes command tabs and command sets that relate to a specific aspect of your project.
The user interface is actually a collection of a number of components:
Command tabs (such as Home, Insert, Page Layout, Formulas, Data, Review, and View in Microsoft® Office Excel® 2007) stretch across the screen just below the window title bar.
Command sets are the commands available for the selected tab that relate to what you’re trying to do. The name of the command set appears below the commands (for example, Clipboard, Font, and Alignment are shown in Figure 2-1).
Contextual commands appear only when an object (table, chart, and so on) is selected.
Command Tabs
The menu system you are used to seeing in Microsoft Office has now been replaced with a series of command tabs that relate directly to the tasks you need to accomplish. For example, the new command tabs in Microsoft® Office Word 2007 are File (marked by the 2007 release logo), Home, Insert, Page Layout, References, Mailings, Review, and View (see Figure 2-2). In Office Excel 2007, the command tabs are File, Home, Insert, Page Layout, Formulas, Data, Review, and View.
Figure 2-2. The command tabs in Office Word 2007 correspond to the different tasks of preparing a document.
The tabs correspond directly to the stages of the process you’re likely to follow as you create a project in an application. For example, when you’re creating a worksheet, you need commands related to data entry, editing, and formatting. Further on in the process, you might want to work with the information on the worksheet by sorting, filtering, consolidating, or validating it. These commands are available in the Data tab, further down the row in the Office Excel 2007 command tab display.
Command Sets
Different commands appear in the user interface, depending on the tab you selected. If you click the Home tab in Office Word 2007, one set of commands appears in the user interface; if you click the Review tab, a different set is displayed. This type of filtered tool display cuts down on the number of menus, commands, and dialog boxes you have to sort through to find the items you want. Each command set is grouped according to its function. In Figure 2-3, the Page Setup, Themes, Background, and Arrange groups are all command sets for the Design tab in Microsoft® Office PowerPoint® 2007.
Figure 2-3. The set of commands displayed in the user interface varies, depending on the command tab you select.
Contextual Tools
To keep the design uncluttered and relevant to what you’re doing, contextual command sets appear only when a specific object is selected. Figure 2-4 shows a set of contextual tools that become available after you add a diagram with the SmartArt tool (available in the Insert tab). The name of the displayed contextual tool set appears above the user interface and is highlighted so that you can recognize it easily.
Figure 2-4. Contextual commands display only the commands you need that are related to the currently selected object.
Dialog Launchers
Some command sets on the user interface are also available in traditional style dialog boxes. You can display the dialog box by clicking the dialog launcher in the lower-right corner of the command set. Here’s how it works. Click the command tab you want (for example, Home in Office Word 2007). Now click the small arrow symbol in the lower-right corner of the command set you want to display, which launches the dialog box for that set of commands, as Figure 2-5 shows.
Figure 2-5. Dialog launchers display some command sets in traditional dialog boxes.
Dialog launchers are also available at the bottom of any gallery that shows advanced options. For example, when you choose the Page Layout command tab and click the Columns down arrow, a gallery of column-wrapping settings appears. Click the More Columns option at the bottom of the gallery to launch the Columns dialog box (see Figure 2-6).
Figure 2-6. Click the More Columns option at the bottom of a gallery to display a dialog box of additional options.
Galleries
Galleries are a great visual addition to the design of the new program windows—they make finding the look you want as simple as point and click. The 2007 Microsoft Office system includes two types of galleries. Galleries with only a few selections are typically shown as part of a command set in the user interface; but galleries with multiple selections (such as Themes, Margins, and Position in Office Word 2007) display as drop-down galleries in which you can make your selection.
When you select a command that has a down arrow next to it (which means that additional choices are available), the palette of options appears (see Figure 2-7). You can see at a glance which color combination, format, color scheme, transition, or chart type you want. Just click your choice (or point to it if you want to use the Live Preview feature, described next), and the setting is applied to the current document or a selected object.
Figure 2-7. Galleries enable you to easily find and select the choice that’s right for your project.
Live Preview
Live Preview enables you to try a choice on for size before you select it. Now when you consider an option (such as the Page Color gallery shown in Figure 2-8), you can point to it. The effect is then applied to your document, worksheet, or presentation so you can see how it will look. If you want to keep the change, click the option. If you want to keep looking, point to a different option.
Figure 2-8. Live Preview shows you what the result of your choice will look like before you actually select it.
The new Office 2007 system user interface changes are currently available in Office Word 2007, Office Excel 2007, Office PowerPoint 2007, and Microsoft® Office Access 2007. Some aspects of Microsoft® Office Outlook® 2007 also incorporate the new features.