You might say that from the very beginning, that I have been the
Ribbon's biggest detractor. I have publicly railed against changing the
UI in the first place. I screamed and ranted during beta testing, and
screamed very vocally with everyone at Autodesk that I met during AU 2008.
But, no more.
While I'll agree that there are some issues that still need to be fixed,
and there are more mouse clicks for many commands, I must confess that I
have been using it 100% since 2010 RTM shipped.
I had no choice. I'm developing training material for Inventor 2010, and
I have shed the classic interface forever more. I fully understand
everyone's frustrations with the Ribbon, I've had them all myself.
Here's a timeline of my experience with the Ribbon.
Fall 2008: the Ribbon in beta-1 was virtually unusable, broken, and a
waste of time. Beta two and three offered some improvements, but I was
still very disillusioned and wanting to switch back to the classic UI.
Winter 2008: Beta 3 - still working on it with the Ribbon, but
desperately wanting to switch to the classic interface for real
production. When I needed to do real production, I did it in 2009.
Spring 2009: a breath of fresh air, both outside and with the release of
Inventor 2010. The Ribbon still had a few bugs (still has a couple
issues after SP1), but I dubbed it as being usable, and not a
showstopper. I began not only creating courseware with 2010, but was
using it for the occasional design support request from clients.
Summer 2009: still occasionally cursing that missing command, but this
distraction is becoming more and more infrequent. I'm finding that
virtually everything is there, even though it sometimes appears that
it's buried. Overall, I've become very satisfied and familiar with the
Ribbon-it sure took long enough!
Fall 2009: at least my tomatoes have started to bear fruit BEFORE the
leaves start falling this year. Inventor 2010 is doing the same thing
for me. Although most of my customers have switched to Inventor 2010, I
find that going back to support that 2008 or 2009 user makes me feel
like I've stepped into a time warp. The classic UI is ugly, but
functional, but I find that now after many months of enduring the
Ribbon, I've grown to understand and love it.
More than likely, there are very few Inventor users out there on this
newsgroup that are older than I am. I'll be turning 63 in January (no,
I'm not retiring, sorry to dash hopes!). Age is not the determining
factor for loving or hating the Ribbon. It's more like "dating" that
ugly woman or man long enough until you understand the inner beauty. In
Inventor, just like in love, it's a matter of sticking with it until you
find the jewels.
To Autodesk; please keep improving the Ribbon as I know you will. And,
please quit contacting me and asking me to publish a retraction on my
original opinion of the Ribbon 🙂
By the way, I have reverted my Microsoft Office back to version 2003
after wasting my time with Office 2007.
--
Dennis Jeffrey, Autodesk Inventor Certified Expert
Autodesk Manufacturing Implementation Certified Expert.
Instructor/Author/Sr. App Engr. Tel. (260) 399-6615
http://teknigroup.com