More Windows Ribbon Tools & Resources
As the co-author of the “Introducing Windows® 7 for Developers” book I wrote the two chapters about the new Windows Ribbon Framework. The first Ribbon chapter deals with the Ribbon markup language and the second chapter deals with the code behind. To let the reader the ability to understand and play with the markup language before reading the code behind chapter, I have created an open source project named RibbonExpolorer. The Ribbon team from Microsoft has also created such a tool named PreviewRibbon that they have just released.
Both tools are good and both gives you the ability to play with the markup language. The main difference is that the RibbonExplorer is built in C++ using ATL while the PreviewRibbon is built in WinForm using .NET and COM interop. RibbonExplorer also gives you the ability to change property values on the fly. So if you are a .NET developer that want to have a WinForm based application for Windows 7 and you want to have a Ribbon you can use the PreviewRibbon sources as a good example for interoperating . Another great wrapper for .NET and WinForm can be found in Arik Poznanski blog series about the Windows 7 Ribbon.
And again for full explanations of the Ribbon Markup Language and the Code behind, read the two chapters in the book.
