So with the new Ribbon on top of the SharePoint 2010 page we have an office like feel to working with SharePoint pages. Customization of this ribbon is great, adding your own functionality augmenting what Microsoft provides out of the box. My question is this though, when is it appropriate to use ribbon customization vs an item menu option (i.e. the callout menu on a particular item).
Are there best practices around this? What do you do?
They share a lot of the same options. The ribbon is focused on working with the entire list or library, but still has options pop up when you click on an item that are targeted at that one item. The call-out on a single item is always focused on options for just that item.
So I would say if your looking to do something with an entire list or library, put it in the ribbon. If it is going to be an option specifically tied to one item at a time, put it in the call-out menu, but also try to make it show up in the ribbon if someone doesn't look at the call-out menu.
But that's just my opinion and I haven't had any experience putting custom functionality into either sections.
