Configure the PowerPoint and Excel ribbons

thinkcell has many ribbon controls—that is, tabs, groups, and commands—for PowerPoint and Excel. For example, the default thinkcell ribbon tabs contain thinkcell controls and built-in Office controls organized from left to right to reflect the process of creating a presentation (PowerPoint) and working with data (Excel). As an administrator, you can configure thinkcell controls, built-in Office controls, and controls from other add-ins on the ribbon for users in your organization.

On Windows, configure the ribbon with group policies (see Group policies) or during installation with command-line parameters (see Installation on Windows).

On Mac, configure the ribbon with the defaults command-line tool (see Installation on macOS) or a device management solution (see Managed deployment on macOS).

Configure a ribbon tab with an .officeUI file

Windows only

On Windows, administrators can configure and deploy a customized ribbon tab across their organization with an .officeUI XML file. As an administrator, you can configure the thinkcell ribbon tab or another custom tab with any combination of thinkcell controls, built-in Office controls, and controls from other add-ins. To customize the ribbon as a standard user, see Customize thinkcell ribbon controls.

thinkcell loads your .officeUI tab configuration every time that PowerPoint or Excel opens. In general, thinkcell leaves users' own ribbon customizations, such as the Quick Access Toolbar and additional ribbon tabs, intact. However, if you configure the thinkcell tab and a user has also customized the thinkcell tab in PowerPoint, your configuration will override the user's customization. If a user selects Tools > Restore thinkcell Tab , thinkcell loads the customized tab specified in your XML file and overrides any conflicting user ribbon customizations.

The .officeUI tab configuration overrides the position and label configuration of the default thinkcell tab (see Configure the position and label of default thinkcell tabs).

To configure a customized tab, follow these steps:

1. Create an XML file for a customized tab.
2. Deploy the customized tab.

If you want to add more than one customized tab to the ribbon, please contact our Support team.

Create an XML file for a customized tab

To create an XML file that encodes your customized tab, follow these steps:

1. With thinkcell installed, open the app in which you want to customize a tab—that is, PowerPoint or Excel.
2. Right-click the ribbon and select Customize the Ribbon.

3. In Customize the Ribbon, customize the thinkcell tab or create a new custom tab. You can find the thinkcell tab under the Customize the Ribbon list as thinkcell (Custom). To create a new custom tab, select New Tab.

   Your tab can contain any combination of thinkcell controls, built-in Office controls, and controls from other add-ins. To see all thinkcell ribbon commands, open the Choose commands from dropdown menu and select Main Tabs. In the Choose commands from list, in Main Tabs, open thinkcell Commands > thinkcell Commands.

   You can customize your tab's position on the ribbon, UI label, and controls. For more information, see Microsoft Support.

   When you're finished, select OK.

4. Close the app.
5. In File Explorer, go to %AppData% or %LocalAppData%, depending on whether Office user customizations are roaming or local, respectively. In the Microsoft\Office subfolder, copy the .officeUI file of the application with the customized tab—that is, PowerPoint.officeUI or Excel.officeUI. We recommend that you rename the copied file—for example, as think-cell.officeUI.

If you write the .officeUI file yourself, ensure the following:

• The file is in the standard Custom UI XML format (see Microsoft Learn).
• The ID of the customized tab is ThinkCellTab0.

Deploy the customized tab

Once you've created an .officeUI XML file that encodes your customized tab, deploy the file to the same path for all users—for example, C:\Program Files (x86)\think-cell\customizations\think-cell.officeUI. To load the customized tab, users in your organization must have access to the XML file whenever they open PowerPoint or Excel.

Then, using group policies or installation command-line parameters, specify the path to the XML file. The path can be a relative path from the thinkcell installation folder or an absolute path.

Group policies

To deploy your customized tab with Group policies, follow these steps:

1. Open the thinkcell Tab setting for the app that you want to configure—that is, PowerPoint thinkcell Tab or Excel thinkcell Tab.
2. Select Enabled.
3. In File path, enter the path of the .officeUI file—for example, customizations\think-cell.officeUI. Do not enclose the path in quotation marks.
4. Select OK.

To remove the customized tab, select Not Configured, then select OK.

Installation command line

To deploy your customized tab with installation command-line parameters (see Installation on Windows), run the thinkcell installation file with the parameter RIBBONPPCUSTOMTHINKCELLTAB (PowerPoint) or RIBBONXLCUSTOMTHINKCELLTAB (Excel). Set the parameter to the path of the .officeUI file.

For example, to deploy your customized tab in PowerPoint using an XML file customizations\think-cell.officeUI in the thinkcell installation folder, use the following command-line parameter:

RIBBONPPCUSTOMTHINKCELLTAB=customizations\think-cell.officeUI

To remove the customized tab, run the thinkcell installation file with the parameter set to "". For example, to remove the tab from PowerPoint, use the following parameter:

RIBBONPPCUSTOMTHINKCELLTAB=""

Configure the position and label of default thinkcell tabs

Windows only

On Windows, as an administrator, you can configure the ribbon position and UI label of the thinkcell tabs in PowerPoint and Excel. To do so, in the thinkcell configuration parameters, specify XML attributes that encode the configuration that you want.

If you also configure customized ribbon tabs (see Configure a ribbon tab with an .officeUI file), the customized tabs will overwrite the thinkcell tab configuration.

To specify the position and label of the default thinkcell tab, use the configuration parameters in the following table. After specifying the configuration parameters, to update the ribbon with your changes, open PowerPoint or Excel and select Tools > Restore thinkcell Tab .

When specifying command-line parameters, enclose XML code in quotation marks (" ") and attribute values in two sets of quotation marks ("" ""). For example, on the command line, enter the XML code insertAfterMso="TabHome" as "insertAfterMso=""TabHome""".

RIBBONPPTHINKCELLTABINSERT="insertAfterMso=""TabHome"" label=""My New Tab"""

RIBBONPPTHINKCELLTABINSERT=""

Enable or disable thinkcell tabs

As an administrator, you can enable or disable the thinkcell tabs in PowerPoint and Excel. When you disable the thinkcell tab, thinkcell also hides Reset thinkcell Tab (Windows) and Show thinkcell Tab (macOS) in the Tools menu.

To enable or disable the thinkcell tab, use the following configuration parameters.

sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.microsoft.office.plist com.think-cell.settings.ribbonpp -dict-add NoThinkCellTab -bool true

<dict>
	<key>com.think-cell.settings.ribbonpp</key>
	<dict>
		<key>NoThinkCellTab</key>
		<true/>
	</dict>
</dict>

Show thinkcell commands in a thinkcell group only

Windows only

In PowerPoint, thinkcell adds commands to many ribbon tabs and groups. As an administrator, you can limit thinkcell commands on built-in ribbon tabs to a single thinkcell group on the Insert tab. This configuration parameter doesn't affect the thinkcell tab.

Group policies

To limit thinkcell commands to the thinkcell group with Group policies, follow these steps:

1. Open the group policy setting PowerPoint Ribbon.
2. Select Enabled.
3. Select Do Not Touch Built-In Ribbon.
4. Select OK.

To restore thinkcell commands to other ribbon tabs and groups, deselect Do Not Touch Built-In Ribbon. Then select OK.

Installation command-line

To limit thinkcell commands to the thinkcell group with installation command-line parameters (see Installation on Windows), run the thinkcell installation file with the parameter RIBBONPPDONOTTOUCHBUILTINRIBBON=1.

To restore thinkcell commands to other ribbon tabs and groups, run the thinkcell installation file with the parameter RIBBONPPDONOTTOUCHBUILTINRIBBON=0.

Configure the thinkcell group

Windows only

As an administrator, you can specify the built-in or custom ribbon tab on which the thinkcell group appears, the group's position on a tab, and the group's UI label.

When specifying command-line parameters, enclose XML code in quotation marks (" ") and attribute values in two sets of quotation marks ("" ""). For example, on the command line, enter the XML code idMso="TabHome" as "idMso=""TabHome""".

For more information on configuring the Office ribbon, see Microsoft Learn.

Configure the tab element

To configure the tab element where the thinkcell group appears, use the following configuration parameters.

If you don't specify an id, idMso, or idQ attribute for the tab element, the thinkcell group appears on the Insert tab.

RIBBONPPTABINSERT="id=""TabNew"" label=""My New Tab"" insertAfterMso=""TabHome"""

Configure the group element

To configure the group element for the thinkcell group, use the following configuration parameters.

If you don't specify an id or idQ attribute for the group element, thinkcell automatically generates a unique identifier (id) for the thinkcell group. If you don't specify a label attribute, the group's UI label is thinkcell.

RIBBONPPTABINSERT="idMso=""TabHome""" RIBBONPPGROUPINSERT="insertAfterMso=""GroupFont"" label=""My New Group"""

Configure the customUI element

To use the attributes idQ, insertAfterQ, and insertbeforeQ, you must declare an XML namespace for the customUI element (see Position custom controls with idQ and xmlns). To declare a namespace, in the group policy settings PowerPoint Ribbon or Excel Ribbon in the <customUI option, or using the command-line parametersRIBBONPPXMLNS or RIBBONXLXMLNS, specify the following value:

xmlns:<var>NAMESPACE_ID</var>="<var>NAMESPACE_URI</var>"

Replace the following:

• NAMESPACE_ID: the namespace identifier, e.g., ex
• NAMESPACE_URI: the namespace URI, e.g., http://schemas.example.com/customribbon

RIBBONPPXMLNS="xmlns:ex=""http://schemas.example.com/customribbon""" RIBBONPPTABINSERT="idQ=""ex:TabNew"" label=""My New Tab"" insertAfterMso=""TabInsert""" RIBBONPPGROUPINSERT="idQ=""ex:GroupThinkCell"" insertAfterQ=""ex:GroupCustom"""

Configure a second thinkcell group

In PowerPoint, when you add the thinkcell group to the Home tab, you may want to configure a second thinkcell group. This is because the PowerPoint ribbon has a Home tab in the Normal view (TabHome) and a Home tab in the SlideMaster view (TabSlideMasterHome). To see the thinkcell group on the Home tab in both views, configure a thinkcell group on both tabs.

You can also configure a second thinkcell group on any tab in PowerPoint or Excel.

To configure a second thinkcell group, use the following configuration parameters.

Position custom controls with idQ and xmlns

You need qualified identifiers (idQ) to position custom controls from multiple add-ins on the ribbon. For example, to position the thinkcell tab before or after a custom tab (see Configure the position and label of default thinkcell tabs), both tabs should have an idQ.

A qualified identifier consists of an XML namespace identifier followed by a unique identifier for a custom tab, group, or other control. For example, the qualified identifier ex:TabCustom consists of the XML namespace ex and the unique identifier TabCustom.

To use qualified identifiers, you must declare an XML namespace. To declare a namespace, use the following code:

xmlns:<var>NAMESPACE_ID</var>="<var>NAMESPACE_URI</var>"

Replace the following:

• NAMESPACE_ID: the namespace identifier, e.g., ex
• NAMESPACE_URI: the namespace URI, e.g., http://schemas.example.com/customribbon

Preserve the position of custom controls

If multiple add-ins customize the ribbon, custom controls might not aways appear in the same position. This is because PowerPoint might not always load add-ins in the same order. If, in the example from Configure the customUI element, PowerPoint loads the thinkcell add-in before the add-in that creates the group ex:GroupCustom, then insertAfterQ="ex:GroupCustom" will have no effect. To ensure that custom elements from multiple add-ins always appear in the same place on the ribbon, when you position one custom element relative to another custom element, specify position attributes for both elements that refer to the other. In the example from Configure the customUI element, in the XML code for the group ex:GroupCustom, specify insertBeforeQ="ex:GroupThinkCell".