WPF ribbon control RTW now available for free download
Dear visitor: Please keep in mind that this post is originally from Vibor Cipan's personal blog, the name of which we eventually adopted as our company name together with its conveniently-named URL. We're keeping the posts on our official company blog for all the subscribers to Vibor's blog who have read and commented on his previous posts. Please be aware that this post represents Vibor's personal thinking few years ago and doesn't necessarily represent the opinions of the UX Passion as a company today.
It’s been a while. But now, the WPF ribbon control is available as a free download for all of you. And no, it’s not a wrapper – it’s the real deal – and it also come with application templates and design-time support for Expression Blend and Visual Studio. By popular demand – you can expect more WPF tutorials for ribbon control.
Introduction
Loyal readers of this blog still can remember that one of the first tutorial series (and still one of the most popular ones) on the UXPassion.com blog was about the free WPF ribbon control. Then you also can remember that I stopped the tutorials after Microsoft said that they would slow down their development since they needed to focus on the .NET Framework 4.0 release and many others things. So, after a quite some time:
Don’t wait – go and DOWNLOAD THE FREE WPF RIBBON CONTROL – it is now available for you to download from here.
What’s new
If you have been following my older WPF ribbon tutorials you will be good to start with this. Anyhow, I will provide you with new tutorials very soon to make sure you can start and utilize this great control.
So, what’s new?
First thing is the installation experience – you have a .MSI installer that will install the WPF Ribbon control on your computer and will also install (if you want to) its source code and samples. Keep in mind that the source code is just for your reference and should be used in that manner. Also keep in mind that this Microsoft WPF Ribbon control will work on .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 and .NET Framework 4.0.
MVVM support is now here – ICommand welcome for RibbonButton control! This was something that Microsoft has been citing as a major thing and a reason why WPF ribbon control development was stalled earlier. Now, with this – advanced and modern development scenarios are supported.
Design-time support for Expression Blend and Visual Studio is now available.. Since this is a real control, not a wrapper around native code, you should be able to utilize all the great stuff regarding templating and styling in Visual Studio and (my personal suggestion) Expression Blend 4.
Design-time support for Expression Blend (and Visual Studio)
New project templates for Visual Studio and Expression Blend. However, at this time there seems to be no support for Express editions of Visual Studio – and I’m not sure if Microsoft will add support to those in future, though I’d hope for it.
New project templates for Expression Blend
New project templates for Visual Studio 2010
WPF ribbon tutorials
New WPF ribbon tutorials will be available on UXPassion.com very soon – and they will cover numerous topics staring from really basic techniques to adding and working with sizing behaviors, quick access toolbar, styling and templating controls and I’ll cover a number of UX approaches and ideas for you. So, stay tuned and, again, thanks for all the continuous support with the first WPF ribbon tutorial series.
Let’s keep in touch – You should follow me on Twitter now!
Comments (14)
thank you very much , i cant wait to see your wonderful tutorials :)
Thanks Diaa, are there any specific tutorials you’d like to see?
I am interested in WPF ribbon tutorials, I have applied your older WPF ribbon tutorials and now I’m waiting your new tutorials to start learning journey
thanks again :)
It is much more difficult to develop! Please write the new tutorial series quickly! We need your help!!!
All right, I’ll do my best. Thanks for your comment!
When will WPF team in Microsoft release the Fluent Ribbon for WPF? It is more beautiful than this Ribbon.
Hey, since this ribbon control supports styling and templating, you can adjust its look and feel extensively. I’ll probably write a tutorial about that within next week weeks so stay tuned and thanks for the comment!
Macy, yes you can do that. Just reuse the brushes that we aldeary have. The brush ID’s are defined as static members of RibbonColors class. Button colors are defined as RibbonColors.ButtonNormalBorder, RibbonColors.ButtonNormalBackground etc. Just take a look at the RibbonColors members to get better idea on what is there. There are ton of colors used by the control In your XAML, you first include the Wpf-Ribbon Assembly in your namespace like so:xmlns:dc=”clr-namespace:DevComponents.WpfRibbon;assembly=DevComponents.WpfRibbon”then you just use brushes from our library like this:Hope this helps
Great blog! Touches on all the right points. The WPF team also has a blog that hosts a number of Ribbon tutorials, http://blogs.msdn.com/wpf/.
There’s also a few samples on the MS Downloads page to help you get started.
We’ll be sure to link to your blog. Thank you!
Thanks Saied for nice comment – it’s really great that we are all working towards creating useful resources for the community! You can expect link-backs from my side as well.
Thanks for the nice control, guys :)
Thanks for the post! It makes actually an easier way to create Ribbon Applications.
However, I’m using it on Windows XP SP3 and the window screen when I compile doesn’t have a good design :S
I’ve already compile projects from Fluent Ribbon and the Maximize, Minimize and Close Buttons were very pretty. But in this case, while using the WPF Ribbon Control in Blend, let me show you how I see them:
http://i34.tinypic.com/sy9hjc.jpg
Any idea on how can I change that thing? I suppose this problem is solved if I install Windows 7 or Vista… But I really want it to get working on XP. Thanks in advance!
Hi UX, First let me thank you again for the former series of tutorials for Ribbon , Got me up & running good fashion ( downfall of newbie hobby coders , pretty app that doesn’t do a d*ym thing ! Still learning kindergarden code, but I’m havin’ fun )
My point, using VS C# Express (2010) , create WPF project, reference the ribbon ( my box Win7 = c/program files / Microsoft Ribbon for WPF / v3.5.40729.1 / Microsoft.Windows.Shell.dll & RibbonControlsLibrary.dll )
Follow your instruction to include RibbonWindow etc & ” using Microsoft.Windows.Controls…..” I’m Good To Go in Express ( save & build & I even have ribbon controls in the toolbox , haven’t been able to drag a button onto the application menu but it’s there ).
Button click events seem to have changed now , Can’t code a ” Hello World ” in this sucker but it looks Great ! hahaha , when ya’ get a minute HEEEELLLLPPP !
Thanks Again & In Advance !
Hey…i installed the Ribbon control…but i dont manage how to stylize the tabs :(. can you help me please? I dont know coding, by the way. Thnx.
Hello I am looking forward to your new set of tutorials on the WPF Ribbon. But I do not see them anywhere. Have you posted new ones yet? Thanks
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