The SharePoint online Ribbon & Launcher (tiles)

Today, I am writing about a basics of Ribbon in SharePoint online.

App Launcher: When we are getting logging to the Office 365 page, first we use to get called App launcher which shown us image like this on left side corner of page. By clicking on this icon we can get all available Apps name and icon and we can open our desired apps from here itself.

As I told above the app launcher we con found in the same top left-hand corner as in Office 365  and it will gets our apps from anywhere in SharePoint in other word we can say App Launcher is a centralized menu allowing users to quickly launch applications, browse sites, and access personal files from a single panel.

To open the application using SharePoint App launcher as much as easy like clicking on the App icon and it will get open in another tab

See below screen shot for more details:

Ribbon in SharePoint is a Navigating the ribbon command interface. It is basically a toolbar that shown across the top of each page or site even for List and library as well.  Top label element are in the ribbon called tabs which include lots of frequent uses functionality. Each of tab groups consists of control which we can use when working on page or Lists.

So when we are opening any of page, List or anything which comes under the SharePoint firstly we use to see ribbon option at the first page.

Ribbon in SharePoint online or any other version of on-premises is prepared up of various modules like Tabs, Contextual tabs, Contextual groups, controls etc.

Let’s show you the screen shot of ribbon page for a team site:

Moving to the next option available called Tabs: Tabs in Ribbon is a new way to navigate between the pages in SharePoint instead of using many options to get the options we can navigate the tab page and can get the options. It give you various functions that can customise our task which are the present in form of Custom Actions or ECB menus in Lists and Libraries. Even we can work more with tab adding custom features using code or solutions. Just say for example: we have List and we need to upload thousands of data in one time, using custom code we can create solution make it under the tab, by just clicking on that and assigning path we can upload the data to SharePoint store folder.

We have multiple tabs available under the ribbon, which depends on site, page, list etc...

Below are the few of them:

Browse Tab: This is a Tab to switch between a Page (current context Page) and the Site. This is generally used when you need to the navigation with your sites top navigation bar. See Below

Page Tab: This Tab takes you into the current Page’s context.

Contextual Tabs: These are the tabs, which appear when you select a specific context. For e.g a Library Tools tab will show up if you select something in Library. See below

Sub-Contextual Tabs: These are the Tabs, which appear selected when you select a particular object or from the particular context which they are related to. For examples, if we selected a document in a List or List view a web part the document sub-tab under the Library Tools will appear.

Group: Groups in SharePoint Ribbon are the Containers of various Controls that show up on the Ribbon. We can add our own group in existing or new custom tabs using the Custom Action SharePoint feature using code or manual. See below screen shot for Manage, Actions, Share & Track are Groups

Controls: These are features of SharePoint, which we can represent at the top of the page or list, library.

We have some of below listed controls and we cannot inherit and create our own controls to use in the Ribbon. This totally used by Dev department they are doing the same easily.

You may aware from the below listed control and it is used everywhere in computer world.

Button: A simple button used to perform an action.

Checkbox: A check box used to select an option.

Colour Picker: A grid used to select a colour or style.

Combo Box: A list used to select a value by clicking or typing.

Drop Down: A list used to select a value by clicking.

Fly out Anchor: A button with a down arrow used to open a menu.

Insert Table: A 10-by-10 grid used to specify the dimensions of a table.

Label: A line of text used to provide information.

Menu: A container used to show pop-up menus.

Menu Section: A section used to divide a menu. A menu section can have a title and contain controls.

MRU Split Button: A button used to execute a recently used menu action. This control uses the last action chosen from its submenu as the button action.

Spinner: A control used to insert a value by typing or using the arrow keys to cycle through the values.

Split Button: A control used as both a button and a menu.

Text Box: A control used to enter text.

Toggle Button: A button used to toggle between an on and off state.

As we have discussed above, there will be various types of ribbon view, tabs and controls for each of site, page, site collection, List, Library, calendar etc…

With new look and experience with MS office 365 we will have different view as well which I have explain in my last article:

If we will go with Application available for office 365, we can get another options for ribbon and tab page: