VSTO Ribbon: How can I make the text “Custom Toolbars” disappear from the left of the Ribbon?

Question

I'm using VSTO with Visual Studio 2015 and testing the add-in in Excel 2010. On the left side of my ribbon, there's a text showing "Custom Toolbars". How can I get rid of this text?

Solution: Thanks to @Cindy Meister insights, I went to the properties of the "OfficeRibbon" and clicked on "Tabs" properties. On "ControlIdType" (under "ControlId" option) I chose "Custom" instead of "Office" (which was the previous chosen option) and then the "Custom Toolbars" message disappeared.

Answer 1

This indicates that there is some other customization present besides your VSTO add-in. This customization probably comes from a pre-Ribbon version of Excel, where there were menus and toolbars. People and develpers could - and did - customize these quite frequently. When Office moved to the Ribbon UI in version 2007, these customizations were all dumped into the Add-ins tab on the Ribbon, which is shared.

As a developer you cannot control what appears in the Add-ins tab - it's designed to be shared.

If you don't want to share a tab then you should define your own, custom tab in the VSTO add-in. Probably, you're using the Ribbon Designer? In that case, right-click in the Designer in the Ribbon tab area. From the context menu, choose Add Ribbon Tab .

Any Ribbon tabs you create in this manner will be specific to your VSTO add-in. No one else will be able to add things to it, or execute your controls.