Millions of people use office applications in their daily lives. Such office applications include word processor applications, spreadsheet applications, database applications, slideshow presentation applications, note-taking applications, web page design applications, and so on. Since their initial creation, office applications have grown progressively more complex and new commands have continued to be added. As a result, an office application may easily have hundreds of commands.
Because an office application can have so many commands, it is important to organize the controls associated with the commands in a way that enables a user to find controls quickly. Traditional menu structures are not always effective in organizing commands because the menus can contain too many controls. Traditional toolbar structures are not always effective in organizing commands because the toolbars may occupy too much of the user's visible screen area.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds