RibbonX Image FAQ

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Stefan KZVB — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 21:37:09 GMT

Thank you very much for telling more on transparency now!

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

parency — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 09:07:01 GMT

Unfortunately, loading images into the ribbon causes problems when a user adds a custom control to the Quick Access Toolbar. The image scales down and looks like crap. Is there a better way of handling this?

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

efaller — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 09:24:31 GMT

Unfortunately no, there isn't a good way to fix that. Custom controls can only have one image assigned to them, and if it needs to be displayed in two different sizes (32x32 in the ribbon and 16x16 in the QAT, for example), it'll have to get scaled.

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Stephen Bullen — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 12:00:18 GMT

The GDI+ API calls to load a PNG file as an IPicture in VBA are not that complex (I have a drop-in module available). Will you be creating a KB article showing how to do it?

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

efaller — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 22:35:05 GMT

Hi Stephen - if you would like to publish your VBA module that would be great. The process for publishing a KB article is somewhat complicated.

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Jason — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 02:09:33 GMT

Hi, Is there any way that to get information on the best way to add images to Outlooks Explorer toolbar.

I have several Exchange Extensions that have to use the InstallCommands callback to add the images using

SendMessage(hwndToolbar, TB_ADDBITMAP, 1, lparam(@tbab));

And in Outlook 2007 the transparency is gone completely now. At least in older versions I had a transparency option. Its really frustrating not having documenttation on these things and having to hack around to find something that works.

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

efaller — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 06:26:14 GMT

Jason - the recommended way to do that is to use the Explorer.CommandBars object in the Outlook object model. See this article for an explanation: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/201095

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Jason — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 09:55:21 GMT

Hi efaller

Are you sure, if I add a commandbar button using the commandbars object, surely I won't get the DoCommand event fired in the Exchange Extension, therefore losing the ability to use the callback interface for things like GetSelectionItem and GetSelectionCount, which when used in conjunction with Extended MAPI are like, well I don't know 20-50 times faster (depending on how many properties you are accessing) than using the object model.

Jason

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Stephen Bullen — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 19:17:03 GMT

Eric, I've uploaded the code to my web site, at http://www.oaltd.co.uk/Excel. I'd appreciate it if you can confirm that's the correct method. I guess I could do an MVP-Authored KB article on it.

Stephen

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

efaller — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 19:57:35 GMT

Stephen - your VBA module looks good. Thanks for doing that!

Jason - sorry I don't know more about Exchange Extensions, but I was able to confirm that Outlook 2007 does indeed lose the transparency, at least for low-color icons. Have you tried using a high-color icon with alpha channel transparency?

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Jason — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 00:10:28 GMT

Can I do a transparent bitmap, because of the command

SendMessage(hwndToolbar, TB_ADDBITMAP, 1, lparam(@tbab));

I have to have it point to a bitmap resource.

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Matt — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 05:20:08 GMT

I waded through a bunch of this stuff -- even downloading Stephen's code and thinking how much time it'd save me -- before I realized that for UI stored in a doc or template it's much easier than it sounds:

1. Save the image as a PNG file (32-bit, i.e. full colour and transparency)

2. Use "Insert Icons" on the toolbar of the custom UI editor to add it to the file with your Ribbon XML

3. Instead of using the 'imageMso' attribute for a built-in icon, use image="blah" where blah is the ID shown in the custom UI editor.

And that's all -- no code required. Maybe this was already clear to everyone else, but I thought I'd post it just in case others missed this amongst all the talk about callbacks, GDI+, etc.

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

febwave — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 13:02:00 GMT

I have a button that has a GetImage callback. outlook may call GetImage function ,and ppdispImage has been set. But image has not displayed always.

This is my code.could anyone tell me where code is incorrect? hr is s_ok

HRESULT hr;

HANDLE hIco;

PICTDESC d_PICTDESC;

hr = E_NOTIMPL;

hIco = NULL;

d_PICTDESC.cbSizeofstruct = sizeof(PICTDESC);

d_PICTDESC.picType = PICTYPE_ICON;

hIco = LoadImage(g_hInst,MAKEINTRESOURCE(IDI_ICON1),IMAGE_ICON,12,12,LR_SHARED);

if(hIco != NULL)

{

d_PICTDESC.icon.hicon = (HICON)hIco;

hr = OleCreatePictureIndirect(&d_PICTDESC,IID_IPictureDisp,true,(void**)&ppdispImage);

}

return hr;

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

febwave — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 13:02:16 GMT

I have a button that has a GetImage callback. outlook may call GetImage function ,and ppdispImage has been set. But image has not displayed always.

This is my code.could anyone tell me where code is incorrect? hr is s_ok

HRESULT hr;

HANDLE hIco;

PICTDESC d_PICTDESC;

hr = E_NOTIMPL;

hIco = NULL;

d_PICTDESC.cbSizeofstruct = sizeof(PICTDESC);

d_PICTDESC.picType = PICTYPE_ICON;

hIco = LoadImage(g_hInst,MAKEINTRESOURCE(IDI_ICON1),IMAGE_ICON,12,12,LR_SHARED);

if(hIco != NULL)

{

d_PICTDESC.icon.hicon = (HICON)hIco;

hr = OleCreatePictureIndirect(&d_PICTDESC,IID_IPictureDisp,true,(void**)&ppdispImage);

}

return hr;

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

efaller — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 20:49:48 GMT

The code looks right to me, but I don't usually use LR_SHARED, so that could be the cause of the problem (if the system decides to clean up the shared copy automatically, that explains why your icon does not always display).

Also, as discussed above, PICTYPE_ICON is not recommended, so if you can convert your image to a PNG and use PICTYPE_BITMAP, you may have better results (though icons should work consistenly).

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

febwave — Thu, 28 Dec 2006 04:56:43 GMT

thanks , I have known where code went wrong,"hr = OleCreatePictureIndirect(&d_PICTDESC,IID_IPictureDisp,true,(void**)&ppdispImage);" is incorrect ,"hr = OleCreatePictureIndirect(&d_PICTDESC,IID_IPictureDisp,true,(void**)ppdispImage);" is right,but thank you again.

re: RibbonX Image FAQ

Pratyush — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 12:54:44 GMT

Eric Where we will get Image names for controls used in custom ribbon or a new tab in ribbon ?

I had got one office2007IconGallery.xlsm file from microsoft site but file might contain invalid macros or something like of that makes it corrupt.

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Preserving the alpha channel when converting images

Andrew Whitechapel — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 02:23:46 GMT

Here is a guest post by Eric Faller, Ribbon developer guru and all-round nice guy. It's a follow-up to

Preserving transparency when rendering Office icons

Misha Shneerson — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 19:53:45 GMT

Today I have a guest writer on my blog - Eric Faller. Eric shows the correct way to render Office icons