System Center Ops Mgr, Config Mgr and the Ribbon

Those of you following the news out of TechED Europe will haveheard that the next versions of System Center Configuration Manager and SystemCenter Operations Manager will a new administrative interface based on theOffice Ribbon.

A lot of geeks have a problem with the Ribbon. I’ve regularly seen commenters ongeek blogs declare that OpenOffice (or Libre Office which seems to be the “new thing”) will triumph over MicrosoftOffice because the open source product eschews the Ribbon interface.  The geek attitude comes down to a belief that byreducing the complexity of the administrative interface, there is a flow onreduction in functionality.

For those of you that are familiar with SCCM and Ops Mgr, theshift to the new interface is likely to be a blessing. Although SCCM suffersmore from this than Ops Mgr does, it can be challenging to locate a particularfunctionality area unless you are extremely familiar with the product. I’ve taught SCCM courses for sometime and while students are generally positive about the product, they are lessthan enthusiastic about the interface. It can take some longer to find wherethey do something than to actually do it.

The idea behind the ribbon is that it allows you to accessfunctionality with a minimum of clicking. Rather than dig down into a category,node, sub node and even sub-sub-node, you’llbe able to hit any area of functionality with an average of two clicks. Thecontext sensitive nature of the ribbon will reduce the “Action Pane” problem - when certainfunctionality becomes available in the Action menu when have exactly the rightitem selected. I’m sure I’m not the only one who has beenfollowing instructions, looked over at the Action Pane and thought “okay, where the heck is thatcommand then?”

The trick to understanding the ribbon is that it allowsadministrative tools to have their complexity simplified without reducing theoverall functionality of the product. In fact, because many people aren’t aware of functionality that ishidden away in the recesses of the old interfaces, I suspect that many peoplemigrating to the new versions of SCCM and Ops Mgr will mistake existingfunctionality for new functionality simply because they haven’t noticed it before.

The ribbon is the future of the administrative interface. Itallows you to get where you need to be with a minimum of hunting about. It alsoallows you to become more aware of product functionality that has beenavailable, but until now has been completely hidden.