Hate Office 2007? Try Search Commands.

If Office 2007 has been as frustrating for me as it has been for me, check out a new feature from Microsoft Office Labs called Search Commands.

The problem that Search Commands solved for me is this: even after using Office 2007 for a few months, I still can’t easily find what I’m looking for, and still get frustrated having to look at many toolbar icons that I’ll never use. The way I solve this problem today is by either digging through the Ribbon and cursing, or using Google. Surprisingly, the latter method is often faster.

Search Commands solves that problem, by letting you "google" your Office 2007 commands, and find the right one. It might seem kind of odd to search for commands rather than use a menu, but consider that Word, Excel, and PowerPoint each have at least several hundred commands. It’s a lot faster to type a few keys than it is to browse and scan through a dozen drop-down menus.

If you like QuickSilver, Firefox search keywords, YubNub, the Unix command line, or other keyboard-oriented ways of working, you’ll probably find Search Commands a welcome addition. It’s not perfect, but it’s a big step forward.

One last thing: Search Commands is still considered by Microsoft to be an experimental feature, meaning that it might not be rolled into the Office 2007 code base. This is surprising given the positive feedback this feature has received, and we’ve known for over a decade that the majority of users like to search, not browse. So, if you like Search Commands, express your support here.

How to lose friends and upset customers

Office 2007 has not been the easiest transition for me. Don’t get me wrong — I love learning new software products and services. I’ve used Office nearly every work day since the early 90s, too, so I’m familiar with a lot of its functionality.

The biggest issue is that I’m seeing a *decrease* in my productivity versus Office 2003, and by far the biggest single contributor to this is Office 2007’s "Ribbon".

It’s not the changes that Microsoft made to the layout of the commands. Change is a form of experimentation, which is a great way to learn what works best. I’m happy to invest the time to learn new functionality if it will save me time later on.

The problem is the fact that I can’t customize the ribbon. Because of this, commands that I always use are buried and require multiple mouse clicks to get to. Conversely, commands I never use first-class citizens with single button access.

Now, one of Microsoft’s goals for the ribbon as a way to expose to users the vast range of functionality within Office, so they could more fully utilize the suite, and be more productive. This is a laudable goal.

So, I have no problem with the ribbon per se. (In fact, I find the Style section of the Word 2007 ribbon to be very helpful.) What I have a problem with is that Microsoft made the ribbon not customizable, and there are dozens of commands on the ribbon that I will never use.

For example: I’m never going to use the Word Art, Research, and Translate buttons. Word Art is unprofessional, Wikipedia and Google are way better research tools, and for at least the next ten years, I’ll use a human for translation of important documents. I don’t need translation tooltips to display Saudi Arabian Arabic.

I could go on and on, but the point is: why can’t I hide these commands, and show commands for Insert Table Column, Remove Column, Insert Row, and Remove Row, which I use dozens of times daily?

I could do exactly this kind of customization in Office 2003, and it made me much more productive by saving me literally thousands of mouse clicks per month.

But it gets worse…

In an effort to learn more about how to work around these Ribbon issues, I viewed an article on Microsoft’s website, "How I learned to stop worrying and love the ribbon". (http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/help/HA102553291033.aspx)

The tone of the article is amazingly arrogant. Here are some quotes:

This Ribbon replaced the menus and toolbars — yes, the self-same menus and toolbars that you constantly griped about and yet were suddenly so attached to. You cannot imagine how much whiny feedback I received about the change

(Actually, as someone who remembers the rollout of the toolbars in the early 90s, I can attest that there was no griping about toolbars when they were introduced.)

Expand your mind, dude

(This from one of the most respected companies in America, if not one of the most loved.)

…you certainly cannot switch to toolbars and menus from a previous version of Office (as if).

(Actually, past versions of Microsoft products have carried over older user interfaces. Windows 95 included the Windows 3.1 File Manager, which was a smart insurance policy in case users hated the (then new) Windows Explorer. Windows XP allowed users to display the Start menu a la Windows 2000, another, similar smart insurance policy.)

It’s just that there are so many of you unique snowflakes out there that we can’t possibly anticipate what everyone is going to need all the time.

(Um, isn’t this precisely why one should allow the Ribbon to be customizable?)

Now, granted, the article is intended to be funny. But, to me anyway, it doesn’t come off as entertaining, and instead sounds condescending and arrogant. You have to wonder how this piece of writing was allowed to be posted on Microsoft’s website.