Jensen Harris: An Office User Interface Blog : Keyboard

A Numbers Game

jensenh — Fri, 14 Apr 2006 17:00:00 GMT

On Wednesday, I mentioned that as part of the keyboard work we've done for Beta 2, controls on the customizable Quick Access Toolbar are auto-assigned KeyTips.

For example, the first item in the QAT can be accessed by typing ALT+1, the second item can be accessed by typing ALT+2, etc.

Because you can add and remove buttons, galleries, groups, and all other Ribbon controls to the QAT, and because you control the order of the items within the toolbar, you can in effect customize the ALT+Number shortcuts to be anything you like, just by adding the control for the feature you want to access to the QAT.

One of the interesting things you might wonder about when you see Office 2007 in action is what happens after you've added nine controls to the Quick Access Toolbar, and all of the ALT+1-9 shortcuts are used up.

The answer is that we keep numbering, and the tenth feature gets the access key sequence ALT+09, the eleventh feature gets ALT+08, the twelfth gets ALT+07, and so on.

So the sequence goes: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 09, 08, 07, 06, 05, 04, 03, […]

On first glance this might seem a highly irregular sequence--why not continue with 01, 02, 03, 04?

It all comes down to efficiency; two main factors went into our thinking. First, the number of controls people have on their Quick Access Toolbar is a curve. The vast majority of people will end up with the default number of icons (currently 4.) And the next highest is likely to be 5, then 6, then 7, etc. So there will be far more people with ten commands than twenty commands. Exactly how big that discrepancy is remains to be seen in the data as more people use the product.

Secondly, in the standard keyboard layout for virtually all locales, the number keys are arranged at the top from 1 to 0. This means that 09 is far easy to type for most people than 01, because 0 and 9 are located directly next to one another and 0 and 1 are located at the furthest ends of the keyboard. So, we assign the most efficient possible remaining KeyTip sequence (09) to the tenth-most-important button on the QAT, and we assign decreasingly efficient sequences (down to 01) to the eleventh and beyond.

You might be thinking: "ah, but on the NumPad, 01 is actually worse than 09." Well, the truth is that the NumPad won't work for these shortcuts; they must be typed using the main number area on the keyboard. Office has long-standing keyboard shortcuts for some of the Alt+NumPad entries, and others are used in Windows to generate special characters (such as Alt+0169 on the NumPad to generate the copyright symbol.)

What comes after 01? Sign up to receive Beta 2 and find out...

Verklärte Macht: Keyboard Revisited

jensenh — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 17:00:00 GMT

I mentioned in mid-March that we had been putting a lot of thought and effort into improving the Office 2007 keyboard access model for Beta 2. Getting keyboarding for the new UI model right is a necessity--not only for accessibility but also for efficiency. As a result, we've continued to tweak and redesign and tweak some more based on all of the feedback we've received.

Today, I'm finally ready to reveal the improved keyboard model you'll find in Beta 2.

There are four ways to access features using the keyboard in Office 2007: shortcuts, menu accelerators, KeyTips, and navigation.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts are dedicated keystrokes you can use to access specific features, such as CTRL+B for Bold, CTRL+X for Cut, and CTRL+P for Print.

Every one of the Office 2003 keyboard shortcuts continues to work the same in Office 2007; there's no relearning necessary.

We've also used the data from the Customer Experience Improvement Program to track down the most frequently-used features without good keyboard shortcuts so that we could add them. For instance, you'll find CTRL+ALT+V added for Paste Special.

Menu Accelerators

"Menu accelerators" refer to the way that you can use the keyboard to kind of "navigate" the top-level menus in old-UI programs. For example, you can type ALT+O+H+R to navigate Format - Sheet - Rename to access the Format Sheet dialog box in Excel 2003.

Starting in Beta 2, you will be able to use all of the menu accelerators just like you were running Office 2003. If you have ALT+I+R memorized in Excel (Insert - Row, in case you were wondering) you can type it and it will magically work. No need to activate any sort of legacy keyboard mode or anything like that--your menu accelerators just work.

We've designed this part of the feature for people who have these keystrokes memorized ("in the fingers" as they say), so there's no UI to explore the old menu structure. In other words, this isn't the way to discover new ways of doing things with the keyboard.

But, when you do start to enter an Office 2003 menu accelerator, we pop up a small window over the Ribbon to show what keys you've pressed and that you're entering an Office 2003 menu accelerator.

Using Office 2003 menu accelerators

KeyTips

KeyTips are the new way to access commands with the keyboard. I describe KeyTips in great detail in my original keyboard article from last year.

In short, every single command in the Ribbon receives a letter which you can press to activate that command. Unlike in the menus-and-toolbars system, every feature in the Ribbon is efficiently keyboard accessible.

The letters are indicated by small "KeyTips" which indicate the letter to press to activate the control. KeyTips are displayed using the Alt key, so using them feels similar to how menu navigation works in Windows.

KeyTips in the PowerPoint Slide Show tab

The feedback we got from Beta 1 on the KeyTips was loud and clear: good idea, but the KeyTips key sequences are too long and inefficient compared to the old menu accelerators.

So, we went back to the drawing board and looked at how we could shorten KeyTip sequences to be as short as possible. We removed an extra keystroke everywhere by no longer requiring you to type the KeyTip for the group a control is in. And, we did away with most of the two-letter KeyTips by adding numbers as potential KeyTips for very dense Ribbon tabs.

The result? We ran an analysis of every single command in Office 2003 and Office 2007--and the average "keystroke length" to access a command has gone down considerably. And for frequently-used commands in Office 2007, most are accessible with Alt + two keystrokes, just like the top-level menu commands in Office 2003.

We also added one-letter KeyTips for commands in the customizable Quick Access Toolbar: Alt+1 for the first command through Alt+9 for the ninth command (after that, it's double digits.) This lets you have hyper-efficient keyboard shortcuts to your favorite features.

KeyTips in the customized Quick Access Toolbar

So we hope that KeyTips are now worthy of even the most keyboard-obsessed Office user. And, because every single command can be accessed with an efficient set of keystrokes, the result is a much more accessible product.

Navigation

The final way to use the keyboard to access features is not really about efficiency, but about accessibility and discoverability.

You can use the arrow keys and Tab to navigate the Ribbon, letting the accessibility aid (such as a screen reader) identify the controls you have selected. Because the Ribbon uses dialog box-like navigation, it provides enhanced accessibility compared to the old toolbars.

Summary

It's been a very long road, but thanks to everyone's feedback, we finally feel like we have a keyboard model to be proud of. There's no more "legacy" keyboard mode, and the design of KeyTips has been much improved.

In short:

Every keystroke from prior versions continues to work out-of-the-box: no special mode required.
KeyTips provide a more efficient and complete keyboard model than prior Office user interfaces.
KeyTips + navigation provides a great accessibility experience.

Note that there are still a few issues we're still looking into for post-Beta 2, such as making sure you can use KeyTips while keeping the Ribbon collapsed.

But we feel like Beta 2 represents a huge step forward for the keyboard model of the new Office UI.

An Unintentional Week of Keyboard

jensenh — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 15:00:03 GMT

For some reason (entirely unintentional) I've spent a bunch of this week babbling about keyboard issues. I guess you can tell where my mind is right now.

So, I knew there was no better way to end the week than making sure you saw what's become known as "Charlie's List" over on the venerable Excel blog. It's the biggest list of Excel keyboard shortcuts known to humankind, in PDF form.

And I'll leave you with one last keyboard treat for the weekend, for those of you with Office 2003. Try holding down ALT and clicking a single word in your document. This is pretty useful especially if you select the Translation reference book and you're trying to decipher a language you barely know. It's also a quick way to get definitions, synonyms or other context-sensitive research help.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Odds, Ends, Shortcuts, and Accelerators

jensenh — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 15:00:00 GMT

First of all, due to a glitch in the system, Howard's article about the philosophy behind Themes in Office 2007 got posted very late yesterday. It's well worth the read, so if you didn't catch it yesterday, you might consider checking it out today.

The team has been enjoying the interesting discussion around keyboard accelerators in Office. If nothing else, the various ideas posted and the ensuing discussion exhibit how complicated even seemingly simple design decisions can become when many people are affected by and care about the outcome.

Something that came up as a point of interest in the comments was the difference between keyboard shortcuts and accelerators in Windows. I thought I'd take a few words today to talk about the difference between them.

Simon in the comments explained it quite well, so I'll start with his description:

Keyboard shortcuts: these are the individual keystrokes (or combination of keys pressed simultaneously) used to access commands. They appear to the right of the menu item. For example, to access Undo using a shortcut, you press Ctrl+Z.

Keyboard accelerators: these are the little underscores on menus and menu items. They are used to navigate menus. For example, to access Undo using accelerators, press Alt, then E, then U - three separate keystrokes.

Both of these explanations work for a program based on menus and toolbars.

In a Ribbon-based app, keyboard shortcuts remain the same as they were in previous versions.

Keyboard accelerators, on the other hand, have evolved into KeyTips in the Office 2007 model. The trigger key is still ALT, like with accelerators, and the idea of pressing subsequent letters to "navigate" the UI is still present. The major differences of KeyTips are:

Every control gets a key (even unlabeled ones--something impossible with menus)
We can assign keys not in the label of the control. This is because we have, in rare cases, as many as 50 controls available at once. Interestingly, certain international versions of Office have done this for years by putting the accelerator in parenthesis after the command name like this: Command Name (X)

But the user experience of KeyTips should be pretty similar to accelerators--press ALT, and follow the keys on your screen to get to the command you want. Memorize and repeat for efficient access.

I look forward to walking you through the improved Office 2007 keyboard model closer to Beta 2.

Which Letter Is Better?

jensenh — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 15:00:00 GMT

I mentioned a few days ago that the team has been immersed lately in improving the Office 2007 keyboard model. We got a lot of constructive feedback around the model from Beta 1 and so we're hard at work addressing it for Beta 2.

Today, I want to just throw out a minor but important detail of the overall design for discussion to see what you think.

As I mentioned in my original post on the keyboard model, the first step of using the keyboard with the Ribbon is pressing a letter to navigate to the tab which contains the control you want to use. For instance, many apps have a Review tab, and pressing ALT+R puts you in a mode to access the commands on the Review tab with the keyboard by pressing subsequent letters.

One of the questions we're trying to answer is: What letter should we use for the first tab of each of the Office 2007 programs?

Allow me to lay out the pros and cons of some of the myriad possibilities.

The first decision: is it important that the first tab of all Ribbon apps share the same accelerator?

The argument for yes says that certain commands, such as the Clipboard, Find, Bold, and Italic are almost always on the first tab and therefore if you assign the same letter to the first tab everywhere, then keyboard accelerators are more portable across apps.

The counter-argument is that the majority of the features present on the first tabs are actually different--Excel has Sort and Conditional Formatting, while Word has Styles and PowerPoint has Slide Layout. And the commands which are consistent already have well-known keyboard shortcuts (CTRL+F, CTRL+B, CTRL+I, CTRL+X, etc.)

If you do want a common first tab letter, the first thing that comes to mind would be to pick a letter with a mnemonic hook. For instance, "F" is good for File because it's the first letter of the word. However, the names of the first tabs of each of the apps don't have any letters in common. Word is "Write," Excel is "Sheet," PowerPoint is "Slides," Access is "Data." And Outlook's are totally variable based on the item type. So using a letter present in all of the words would be impossible, because there aren't any.

Maybe instead we should optimize around picking a common letter that's easy to type; after all, probably 90% of keyboard accelerators in Office 2007 will start with this keystroke. Millions of people will type it millions of times a day.

So maybe something on the home row of the keyboard? Something on the left side so that you can hold on to the mouse? Dig up the research about which letters are easiest to type? "F" and "J" have the little "home row" dots on them, but F is used for File. Wouldn't people laugh at us if we gave the first tab "J" even if there's a good reason?

"H" is another possibility, since it's easy to type, you could imagine it stands for "Home," and sometimes we think of the first tab as the "home tab" because it's where you will spend most of your time.

Or maybe you go with "S" because it is the first letter of the name of two of the first tabs (in Excel and PowerPoint). But, if you get used to hitting ALT+S to access the most common commands, you might get tripped up because in Outlook, the same shortcut immediately sends the e-mail you're working on. So maybe "S" isn't the best idea either.

Maybe we should use some other easy-to-type combination, say ALT+SPACE or ALT+ENTER or ALT+ALT even. Unfortunately, all of them already have well-established behaviors in Windows or Office which cannot be changed.

There are other factors which go into the design as well, such as localization issues and the fact that some of the letters are reserved and cannot be used. But for simplicity's sake I won't get into those here.

So, what should we do? Is it important that the first tabs share a common letter, and if so, which one should we use? Or, should we pick the letter which works best for each program (probably mnemonically) and have inconsistency between the apps? Or something else we haven't thought of yet?

Which letter is better?

The Keyboard At Your Command

jensenh — Tue, 14 Feb 2006 15:00:01 GMT

We've been working a lot lately on improving the Office 12 keyboard model, so my mind is trapped in a keyboard shortcut frame of mind. I don't have anything to share on this subject yet (we're still working on the design), and when I do I'll certainly post here. But thinking about this so much gave me the inspiration for today's post.

Whenever I write about keyboard access in Office, people send comments along the lines of "I wish it was easier to figure out what the keyboard shortcuts in Office were."

There are, as you might expect, a lot of web resources on the subject. But I recommend the great Office Online site, which has an incredible stash of information to help you use Office. Click the Assistance link on the left side to start digging in.

To save you time, I've compiled the list of guides to keyboard shortcuts for all of the Office programs. Don't miss the "Show All" link at the top of each page which formats the page in a way suitable for printing.

The Office assistance team has also created a number of other useful resources around using the keyboard with Office. Here are some of them:

These are just a few of the over 100 articles on using the keyboard in Office. You can view the full list here. And don't worry, the keyboard shortcuts will continue to work in Office 12.

Now you're ready to impress friends, family and co-workers with your mouseless command of Office.

Stroking the Keys in Office 12

jensenh — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 17:00:00 GMT

There are three ways to use the keyboard to get work done in the new Office 12 UI.

Type 1: Keyboard Shortcuts

Let's start with the simplest and most direct form of keyboard access: keyboard shortcuts. Keyboard shortcuts are single key combinations that perform a command. Some of the most well-known shortcuts in Office are CTRL+S for save, CTRL+P for print, and CTRL+B for bold.

All of the keyboard shortcuts in Office continue to work exactly as they did in previous versions. In fact, we're doing more in the UI to advertise the keyboard shortcuts and adding new ones based on usage data. That's because keyboard shortcuts will usually be the single most efficient way to perform commands with the keyboard.

Word continues to support customizable keyboard shortcuts as it did in previous versions, although this capability hasn't been extended to any of the other programs yet.

Type 2: Accelerating the Ribbon with KeyTips

In menus-based Windows UI, you can navigate the top-level menus by pushing Alt + a series of accelerators (underlined characters in each menu item) to "navigate" the menu structure like you would with the mouse.

"KeyTips" take the keyboard accelerator idea and adapt and extend it to take advantage of the Ribbon.

When you press ALT in Office 12, KeyTips appear in front of the Ribbon tabs and each of the chunks in the tab. KeyTips are little tooltip-like indicators with a single letter or combination of letters in them, indicating what to type to activate the control under them:

(Click to view full picture)

In the case of the picture above, I could type 'I' to navigate to the Insert tab, or press 'U' to navigate to the Page Setup chunk. When I press 'U', the next set of KeyTips appear, this time showing letters for every control within the Page Setup chunk:

(Click to view full picture)

Now, I can press any of the letters indicated to perform the command under the KeyTip. We've even extended the metaphor to menus and dropdowns hosted in the Ribbon:

(No need to click, there's no bigger version!)

In the above example, I could press ALT+U+G to toggle the Excel gridlines. If I wanted to memorize a keyboard shortcut so that it worked from wherever I was in the product, I would memorize ALT+P+U+G (the P is for switching to the Page Layout tab).

Overall, this system has some advantages. Number one, it is very easy for people to learn--even people who are normally turned off by using the keyboard. I like to call it "Hansel and Gretel." You just follow the crumbs of bread, pushing the letters as you go. It couldn't be simpler.

Second, KeyTips allow every control in the product to be keyboard accessible. In Office 2003, only the menus could be easily navigated using the keyboard; gaining keyboard access to toolbars could be done but only with an extravagantly long and convoluted series of keystrokes. In the new system, everything can be accessed efficiently with the keyboard, helping keyboard aficionados get even more done with just their trusty 101 keys.

Third, KeyTips take advantage of the Ribbon's modality to help save keystrokes in the same way that it helps to reduce mouse clicks. When you're in a Ribbon tab, you don't have to press the letter for that tab to use the commands within it. Press the letter for the chunk and command you want directly. In the same way that you save mouse clicks because all of the table layout commands are on one tab, you save keystrokes as well.

Of course, for those most common keystroke combinations--the ones you intend to memorize--you'll probably want to remember and use the first letter, even though it's not necessary if you're already in the tab. Doing so ensures that you can use a consistent key combination no matter what Ribbon tab is up.

So, why did we design KeyTips, vs. going with a more traditional "underlined accelerator" approach? One, the Ribbon is dense, and on some tabs, we would have run out of letters quickly. Two, we wanted to provide keyboard access to controls regardless of their display state. This means that even controls without text labels or that are part of a "button set" (like Bold-Italic-Underline) have KeyTips.

I believe it will be beneficial for most keyboarders to use the KeyTips system, especially since it puts virtually everything you can do with Office within a small number of keystrokes.

Type 3: Office 2003-compatible Keyboard Accelerators

Yet, we know you hardcore keyboard elements are out there. You've got the "ALT+O+H+R" tattoo and you can use Excel with your eyes closed.

While I think even you would benefit from KeyTips is the long run, you'll be happy to know that you can turn on a mode in which all of the keyboard accelerators from previous versions of Office work. It's as if you're navigating the "phantom" Office 2003 menu system right in Office 12. We show hints in the status bar to help keep track of where you are and what you've typed.

We know it's important that you can be effective day one with Office 12, and being able to fall back on familiar keyboard accelerators is an important part of that mission.

Conclusion

We designed the Office 12 interface to incorporate a rich set of goodies for keyboard lovers. There's more I didn't mention (such as using the keyboard to navigate the Ribbon as a 2D document for use with a screen reader), but I believe I covered the essentials.

There's a new mechanism for accessing UI with the keyboard called "KeyTips." KeyTips provides consistent, efficient access to every control and command in the product. But, if you prefer, you can continue using the old keyboard accelerators that are burned into your brain. It's up to you, but I'm hoping the bread crumb trail leads a whole new generation of keyboard newbies to the candy house to try a bite.

(Don't worry, I won't pop you in the oven!).