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I'm going to disagree here. Alice is a new user who has never used Word before. Between word 2003 and 2020, I grant she'll pick up 2020 much more quickly - poi

I'm going to disagree here. Alice is a new user who has never used Word before. Between word 2003 and 2020, I grant she'll pick up 2020 much more quickly - point in favour of the new one. Bob is an employee who uses Word just short of 4 hours a day, 5 days a week writing and editing reports (the rest of the time he spends in Outlook, excel etc.). If there's a task that Bob does 50 times in a typical week, then it doesn't matter so much to him whether it takes a bit longer to learn the command (after about the 150th time he'll have got used to it), but it matters a lot how fast he can do it once he's learnt it. Bob literally becomes more productive by having an interface which he can operate by muscle memory, in a way that more than pays off the initial training costs. Think of keyboard shortcuts for example: they're completely unintuitive to a newcomer, but with experience, Control+Z and Control+C, Control+V and the like save time, and time is money. My favourite word trick in this category, incidentally, is Control+Space "remove formatting" for text you've pasted in from elsewhere; it doesn't work all of the time though. You used to be able to do Control+Shift+V for "paste as plain text", I don't know which version removed that again but I consider it a great loss. Paste -> Keep Text Only takes just longer enough to be annoying.

Tijdreiziger 6y ago
So what's kept Bob from committing the ribbon interface to memory in the past 17 years?
- XorNot 6y ago
  The ribbon interface removed customizability, and inflated the size of all the common commands (and also made it impossible to get them back without 3rd party extensions). Pre-Ribbon I could have the menus, file operations, font and paragraph settings, and the reviewing tool bar at the top of my screen. I could have the object and image editing at the bottom. Post-ribbon the exact same amount of space is does a third as much. Reviewing for some reason is now on a separate tab. The menus are less commonly used functions are non-existent, stuck somewhere under "File" which now takes over the whole screen when I open it. It is not just "different" it's worse. It removes the basic ability to prioritize my interface to the types of tasks I'm doing, in favor of some vaguely defined every-user who is not actually a real user.
  - sp332 6y ago
    Just to be clear, the ability to customize existing tabs, and make new ones with whatever commands you want on them, is insufficient? Or is this only a complaint about the defaults?
    - Someone 6y ago
      For those who don’t know: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/customize-the-ribbon-in-office-00f24ca7-6021-48d3-9514-a31a460ecb31 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/customize-the-rib...: “What you can customize: You can personalize your ribbon to arrange tabs and commands in the order you want them, hide or unhide your ribbon, and hide those commands you use less often. Also, you can export or import a customized ribbon.”
      - kayodelycaon 6y ago
        Thank you! I didn’t even know this was possible.
  - craftinator 6y ago
    They've optimized it for the least common denominator, not for specialized use or for power users. Short term this is a positive approach as it's more approachable for people who are just learning or are very lightweight users. But for people who have a lot of experience or use it often, it's a serious regression.
    - airstrike 6y ago
      I'm a "Power User" and I've memorized every single hotkey on the Excel ribbon interface to the point that I don't care where they are. Wrap text? Alt H A W Open settings? Alt T F T Change to page break view? Alt W I. Go back to normal view with Alt W L Take the border I currently have on the top edge of a cell and swap it to the bottom? Alt H B M Alt+T Alt+B Paste values transposing? Alt H V S V E. Want to follow the old accelerator? Alt E S V E also works Power users don't need to care what the ribbon / menu looks like. They learn hotkeys.
- mook 6y ago
  I believe it's because the ribbon is context-sensitive. What shows up depends on what has focus, and that makes it harder for retention, similar to how Office 2000 has automatically hidden menu items that ended up being confusing.
- red_admiral 6y ago
  At least for this Bob here: 1. The ribbon interface has more levels of depth, which equals more clicks. If most of your commands are in the same toolbar, you can have a lot of commands that are only one click away, even if you don't customise. For example, to "insert symbol" in word to get an em dash or non-breaking space or similar, you have to select the insert tab, click the symbol dropdown and then "more symbols ...". Used to be one click on the "omega" button, or two via the menu (insert / symbol). The fact that I have to move the mouse from one end of the screen to the other and then half the way back again also doesn't help. 2. Maybe this is just me but Alt+N, U, M for "insert symbol" is a lot harder for me to memorise than "the button with an omega up there to the right". It feels less intuitive somehow - I really like working with visual muscle memory (if that's a thing) where I remember the place and shape of a button. 3. Customisability. Yes you can do this to some extent with the ribbon, but in Excel you can't just swap out "merge and center" with "merge across (but do not center)", you'd have to replace the whole "section" - I've tried. 4. Speaking of visual muscle memory - the number of times I've come in to work and found that my ribbon has changed in an update overnight. Some of these are work installing new plugins, but most of it is microsoft adding new "features". No thanks, I don't want my documents "integrated with LinkedIn" when I'm working to a deadline. 5. There have been several major changes to how the ribbon looks and works as Word has gone through new versions since it was introduced - in a lot less than 17 years. Of course that happened with toolbars too (I think around 2000 everything went "flat style", but you could at least turn it off), but I found it easier to adapt back then. Maybe I'm just getting old but each new version that comes out feels like learning half the things I need for work all over again.
jtmarl1n 6y ago
I have better luck pressing shift as the first button in the sequence for the "paste as plain text" but I agree it does not always work. Shift+Control+V
dethos 6y ago
indeed. Focusing only on the newcomer and more precisely the person using it for the first time is just a fraction of the "problem".
rubber_duck 6y ago
Your argument supports his - Ribbon is better for discovery, keyboard shortcuts are there for routine performance. It's not just begginers who value feature discovery.
Const-me 6y ago
> used to be able to do Control+Shift+V for "paste as plain text", I don't know which version removed that again Try Control+Alt+V. I have Office professional plus 2016, works here, however it opens a popup. Plain text is at the end of the list, making the complete sequence Control+Alt+V, End, Enter.
- listenallyall 6y ago
  That is no shortcut, that is an abomination. Basic Ctrl-V should be simple plain text paste. honestly, how often do you want the formatting from the source, vs. seamlessly matching the target?
  - Const-me 6y ago
    > That is no shortcut, that is an abomination I can see how it's unusable on a laptop, on a full-size PC keyboard that's OK. > how often do you want the formatting from the source, vs. seamlessly matching the target? I don't write word documents unless I want rich text features. Just for text there's nothing wrong with plain text or markdown files. Copy-pasting from visual studio is the easiest way to apply good quality syntax highlighting to a code snippet. The IDE is even smart enough to copy them with dark-on-white colors despite I use dark theme. Also, I often cut & paste within the same document.
    - listenallyall 6y ago
      >> I don't write word documents unless I want rich text features. Just for clarification, Paste as Plain Text doesn't paste an unformatted string, it blends with the target formatting. So for example if you are copying a phrase you copied off a web page into a Word doc where the current paragraph is 12pt Georgia, you get 12pt Georgia no matter what the formatting was on the original document. The default Paste will attempt to replicate the color, weight, font size and family of the original web page into your Word doc, which is highly unlikely to fit in with the rest of your document.
- red_admiral 6y ago
  Thanks! I remember in years gone by, there was a (Sun?) keyboard with extra keys down the left with names like cut, copy, paste, insert, close and so on. I'm half tempted to buy one of those gaming keyboards with programmable macro keys and map one of them to this "paste as plain text" sequence.
jakamau 6y ago
Speaking only for myself, but the ribbon interface helped me learn the majority of keyboard shortcuts I use today. Once I leveled up past basic Ctrl+C/V/X, hitting Alt and having the Ribbon UI guide me through the shortcut combinations was helpful. I concede Control+Shift+V is easier, but having a visual guide until I finally memorize all the different paste options with ALT H V has it's merits as well.
listenallyall 6y ago
Paste as Plain Text should be the default. The inability to do so via the right-click context menu in Office (like Chrome allows) drives me nuts. Perhaps an exception if you are copying/pasting from the same document, although personally I'd still prefer plain text.
- akho 6y ago
  You can make it a default. It's under 'Advanced' in options. Also, when you paste, Word shows a small button labeled 'Ctrl' — you can click it or press Ctrl, and adjust your paste.

Tijdreiziger 6y ago

So what's kept Bob from committing the ribbon interface to memory in the past 17 years?

XorNot 6y ago
The ribbon interface removed customizability, and inflated the size of all the common commands (and also made it impossible to get them back without 3rd party extensions). Pre-Ribbon I could have the menus, file operations, font and paragraph settings, and the reviewing tool bar at the top of my screen. I could have the object and image editing at the bottom. Post-ribbon the exact same amount of space is does a third as much. Reviewing for some reason is now on a separate tab. The menus are less commonly used functions are non-existent, stuck somewhere under "File" which now takes over the whole screen when I open it. It is not just "different" it's worse. It removes the basic ability to prioritize my interface to the types of tasks I'm doing, in favor of some vaguely defined every-user who is not actually a real user.
- sp332 6y ago
  Just to be clear, the ability to customize existing tabs, and make new ones with whatever commands you want on them, is insufficient? Or is this only a complaint about the defaults?
  - Someone 6y ago
    For those who don’t know: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/customize-the-ribbon-in-office-00f24ca7-6021-48d3-9514-a31a460ecb31 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/customize-the-rib...: “What you can customize: You can personalize your ribbon to arrange tabs and commands in the order you want them, hide or unhide your ribbon, and hide those commands you use less often. Also, you can export or import a customized ribbon.”
    - kayodelycaon 6y ago
      Thank you! I didn’t even know this was possible.
- craftinator 6y ago
  They've optimized it for the least common denominator, not for specialized use or for power users. Short term this is a positive approach as it's more approachable for people who are just learning or are very lightweight users. But for people who have a lot of experience or use it often, it's a serious regression.
  - airstrike 6y ago
    I'm a "Power User" and I've memorized every single hotkey on the Excel ribbon interface to the point that I don't care where they are. Wrap text? Alt H A W Open settings? Alt T F T Change to page break view? Alt W I. Go back to normal view with Alt W L Take the border I currently have on the top edge of a cell and swap it to the bottom? Alt H B M Alt+T Alt+B Paste values transposing? Alt H V S V E. Want to follow the old accelerator? Alt E S V E also works Power users don't need to care what the ribbon / menu looks like. They learn hotkeys.
mook 6y ago
I believe it's because the ribbon is context-sensitive. What shows up depends on what has focus, and that makes it harder for retention, similar to how Office 2000 has automatically hidden menu items that ended up being confusing.
red_admiral 6y ago
At least for this Bob here: 1. The ribbon interface has more levels of depth, which equals more clicks. If most of your commands are in the same toolbar, you can have a lot of commands that are only one click away, even if you don't customise. For example, to "insert symbol" in word to get an em dash or non-breaking space or similar, you have to select the insert tab, click the symbol dropdown and then "more symbols ...". Used to be one click on the "omega" button, or two via the menu (insert / symbol). The fact that I have to move the mouse from one end of the screen to the other and then half the way back again also doesn't help. 2. Maybe this is just me but Alt+N, U, M for "insert symbol" is a lot harder for me to memorise than "the button with an omega up there to the right". It feels less intuitive somehow - I really like working with visual muscle memory (if that's a thing) where I remember the place and shape of a button. 3. Customisability. Yes you can do this to some extent with the ribbon, but in Excel you can't just swap out "merge and center" with "merge across (but do not center)", you'd have to replace the whole "section" - I've tried. 4. Speaking of visual muscle memory - the number of times I've come in to work and found that my ribbon has changed in an update overnight. Some of these are work installing new plugins, but most of it is microsoft adding new "features". No thanks, I don't want my documents "integrated with LinkedIn" when I'm working to a deadline. 5. There have been several major changes to how the ribbon looks and works as Word has gone through new versions since it was introduced - in a lot less than 17 years. Of course that happened with toolbars too (I think around 2000 everything went "flat style", but you could at least turn it off), but I found it easier to adapt back then. Maybe I'm just getting old but each new version that comes out feels like learning half the things I need for work all over again.

jtmarl1n 6y ago

I have better luck pressing shift as the first button in the sequence for the "paste as plain text" but I agree it does not always work. Shift+Control+V

dethos 6y ago

indeed. Focusing only on the newcomer and more precisely the person using it for the first time is just a fraction of the "problem".

rubber_duck 6y ago

Your argument supports his - Ribbon is better for discovery, keyboard shortcuts are there for routine performance. It's not just begginers who value feature discovery.

Const-me 6y ago

> used to be able to do Control+Shift+V for "paste as plain text", I don't know which version removed that again Try Control+Alt+V. I have Office professional plus 2016, works here, however it opens a popup. Plain text is at the end of the list, making the complete sequence Control+Alt+V, End, Enter.

listenallyall 6y ago
That is no shortcut, that is an abomination. Basic Ctrl-V should be simple plain text paste. honestly, how often do you want the formatting from the source, vs. seamlessly matching the target?
- Const-me 6y ago
  > That is no shortcut, that is an abomination I can see how it's unusable on a laptop, on a full-size PC keyboard that's OK. > how often do you want the formatting from the source, vs. seamlessly matching the target? I don't write word documents unless I want rich text features. Just for text there's nothing wrong with plain text or markdown files. Copy-pasting from visual studio is the easiest way to apply good quality syntax highlighting to a code snippet. The IDE is even smart enough to copy them with dark-on-white colors despite I use dark theme. Also, I often cut & paste within the same document.
  - listenallyall 6y ago
    >> I don't write word documents unless I want rich text features. Just for clarification, Paste as Plain Text doesn't paste an unformatted string, it blends with the target formatting. So for example if you are copying a phrase you copied off a web page into a Word doc where the current paragraph is 12pt Georgia, you get 12pt Georgia no matter what the formatting was on the original document. The default Paste will attempt to replicate the color, weight, font size and family of the original web page into your Word doc, which is highly unlikely to fit in with the rest of your document.
red_admiral 6y ago
Thanks! I remember in years gone by, there was a (Sun?) keyboard with extra keys down the left with names like cut, copy, paste, insert, close and so on. I'm half tempted to buy one of those gaming keyboards with programmable macro keys and map one of them to this "paste as plain text" sequence.

jakamau 6y ago

Speaking only for myself, but the ribbon interface helped me learn the majority of keyboard shortcuts I use today. Once I leveled up past basic Ctrl+C/V/X, hitting Alt and having the Ribbon UI guide me through the shortcut combinations was helpful. I concede Control+Shift+V is easier, but having a visual guide until I finally memorize all the different paste options with ALT H V has it's merits as well.

listenallyall 6y ago

Paste as Plain Text should be the default. The inability to do so via the right-click context menu in Office (like Chrome allows) drives me nuts. Perhaps an exception if you are copying/pasting from the same document, although personally I'd still prefer plain text.

akho 6y ago
You can make it a default. It's under 'Advanced' in options. Also, when you paste, Word shows a small button labeled 'Ctrl' — you can click it or press Ctrl, and adjust your paste.