An Interview with the Developer of a Silverlight 2 Ribbon Interface

Silverlight Cream for December 02, 2008 -- #444

Community Blogs — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 03:39:25 GMT

Chris Anderson, Tim Heuer, Michael S. Scherotter, and Jonathan van de Veen. Shoutout: If you don't read

re: An Interview with the Developer of a Silverlight 2 Ribbon Interface

Pete Brown — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 21:33:21 GMT

Hi Michael

Not to be a wet blanket here, but...

The ribbon has some serious baggage attached to it. In order to use *any* implementation of the ribbon control, you have to license and comply with the "shalls" and "musts" in the Office UI Guide.

I've been hesitant to use any ribbon control due to that set of restrictions, and how the available third party controls don't meet the requirements 100%, and therefore don't comply.

I totally get why MS has done that, but it is not something we're used to.

Q: What are component vendors’ responsibilities?

A: As for other licensees, component vendors who intend to implement the new Office UI must license the UI from Microsoft and register their products that include the UI. In addition, component vendors are required to include a statement in their license agreements with their customers directing the customers to http://msdn.microsoft.com/officeui to obtain their own license if they wish to create products with the UI.

Q: What are the responsibilities of customers of component vendors?

A: Third parties who obtain Office UI components from component vendors and intend to use them in software need to separately seek a license from Microsoft and comply with its terms in using the components.

Pete

re: An Interview with the Developer of a Silverlight 2 Ribbon Interface

Michael S. Scherotter — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 07:05:09 GMT

Pete,

You're right - this is a new model for Microsoft. The baggage that you mention is a very explicit specification about how the ribbon should look and feel. And for the ribbon it's a lot of work.

From my read of the specification, about 99% of it could be implemented in Silverlight.

Even if they are not creating the control themselves, licensees of the ribbon should read the specification to understand what is needed and required.

Michael