Professional SharePoint® 2010 Branding and User Interface Design

12

Page Editing and the Ribbon

WHAT’S IN THIS CHAPTER?

Adding styles to the ribbon to help content authors create

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consistent content

Adding your own buttons to the ribbon

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Using SharePoint dialogs to open new pages

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Working with the status bar and notifi cation area

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One of the most notable enhancements to the user interface (UI) of SharePoint 2010 is the

addition of a ribbon directly inside the browser. The ribbon acts much the same way that it

does in other Microsoft Offi ce applications: It enables users to modify the settings and styles

of the currently rendered page (among other things).

A part of any designer’s role is to ensure that the content of a website fi ts the branding struc-

ture established for the entire site. Therefore, when a rich text editor is used in SharePoint, the

fonts and colors should match the rest of the site. An easy way to do ad-hoc styling is by using

the ribbon.

Furthermore, because the ribbon is part of the UI, you may be asked to enhance the ribbon to

provide more of the functionality users need to perform their jobs. That’s why it is important

to at least understand the basics of how to add functionality to the ribbon and ensure that the

functionality looks good and is consistent with the rest of the site.

This chapter will help you accomplish both of these goals by showing you how to use the rib-

bon to directly modify page content and enhance the r ...