Grapher 10 Ribbon Bar

When Grapher 10 was released, it included many changes to the user interface. Once such change was the new Ribbon Bar. The Ribbon Bar is designed to better emulate the menu bars in the Microsoft Office Suite.

The Quick Access Toolbar is located above the Ribbon Bar at the top of the Grapher 10 window.

If you are used to the Grapher menu layout from previous versions, it is possible to both customize the Ribbon Bar with the commands you frequently use or restore the Ribbon Bar to the more familiar layout from older versions of Grapher. Customizing the Ribbon Bar

There are many options available for editing the Ribbon Bar in Grapher. To access the customization options, click the File | Customize Ribbon command. In the Customize Ribbon dialog, you can fully customize both the Ribbon Bar and the Quick Access Toolbar. The image above highlights where the Ribbon Bar and Quick Access Toolbar are located.

There are two types of tabs in the Grapher Ribbon Bar: 1) Home and Developer Main tabs, which are always displayed and 2) Tools tabs, which are specific to the Worksheet, Plot, or Grid window that is currently open. These tabs contain the many commands that you use to import data, create and customize graphs, and export your graphs for use elsewhere.

You can customize the Ribbon Bar by clicking File | Customize Ribbon. In the Customize Ribbon dialog (shown below), you can create a New Tab or a New Group and choose the commands that you would like included in that part of the Ribbon Bar. You can also select commands from the available commands on the left and click the Add button to add the command to the selected ribbon on the right. You can also Remove commands by clicking on the command to remove on the right side and clicking the Remove button.

The Customize Ribbon dialog where you can add, organize, and remove commands from the Ribbon. Remove a Tab from the Menu Bar

You can also remove a tab from the menu bar if you do not frequently use those commands. For example, if you do not frequently run scripts with Grapher, it might be useful to remove the Developer tab from your ribbon. Open the Customize Ribbon dialog by clicking File | Customize Ribbon. To remove the Developer tab, or any other tab, in the right-hand column uncheck the box next to Developer. After removing a tab from the ribbon, the commands are still available from the left-hand column for use in a custom tab. Click OK to apply the settings to the ribbon.

Use the Customize Ribbon dialog to Show/Hide Tabs in the Ribbon. Create a Custom Tab with Frequently Used Commands

You can also create custom tab in the ribbon to display only those commands that you use frequently. Click File | Customize Ribbon to open the Customize Ribbon dialog. Click the New Tab button to add a new tab to your ribbon. You can rename the new tab by selecting it in the tab list and clicking the Rename button. To add a command to this tab, select the command from the left column and click the Add button located between the two columns.

Within the Customize Ribbon dialog, you can customize the tabs and commands in the Ribbon.

You can organize your commands into groups within a tab by clicking the New Group button. This will allow you to organize your commands by group. You can see in the image below, that the Frequently Used Commands are organized in the following groups: IO, Create, Add to Graph, Drawing, and Align.

Commands organized in groups on the menu bar.

Additional Tab Customization Options: 1. To add a custom tab, set the Customize the Ribbon section to All Tabs. Click in the list on the right side of the dialog where the custom tab should be located and click the New Tab button. 2. To delete a custom tab, right-click on the tab name in the list on the right side of the dialog and select Delete. 3. To rename a default or custom tab, click on the tab name in the list on the right side of the dialog. Click the Rename button. Type the new name and press OK to make the change. 4. To hide a default or custom tab, uncheck the box next to the tab name on the right side of the dialog. Only checked tabs will be displayed. 5. To change the order of default or custom tabs, click on the tab name that should be moved in the list on the right side of the dialog. Click the up and down arrow buttons on the far right side of the dialog to move the selected tab up or down. Default tabs must remain in their major group. Restore the Standard Menu Bar

There is also the option to make the Grapher interface look more like previous versions of Grapher, with traditional drop-down menus (shown below). To enable this feature, follow the steps given below:

1. Click the File | Options command. 2. In the Options dialog, click the Display link on the left side of the dialog. 3. Check the box next to Show ribbon menus on the right side of the dialog. 4. Click OK to apply the changes. A Plot Menu tab will be added to the Ribbon Bar. 5. Click the Plot Menu tab to display the traditional drop-down style menu.

From the Plot Menu tab, you can access the drop-down style menu.

If you would like to only use the drop-down style menu, you can to turn off the display of other tabs to remove them from view. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Click the File | Customize Ribbon command. 2. On the right side of the dialog, select All Tabs in the Customize the Ribbon list. 3. Uncheck the boxes next to all tab names except for Worksheet Menu, Plot Menu, and Grid Menu. 4. Click OK and only the classic style Plot Menu tab is displayed.

The classic style menus displayed with only the Plot Menu tab.

Please note that none of these solutions will return you completely to the full toolbar/interface of the old program. However, it does give you a setup that has more of the look and feel of old toolbar interface. I hope that these customization options will help you to feel more at home in Grapher 10.

If you are not a Grapher user, or are using an older version, you can test the features and functionality of Grapher 10 by downloading the Demo. Go to our Free Demo Downloads page to download Grapher 10 and test out the new Ribbon Bar interface for yourself.