Ribbon Tab Builder | An easy to use plugin for creating custom tabs for the Ribbon

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

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Latest Update:

Ribbon Tab Builder | An easy to use plugin for creating custom tabs for the Ribbon

Version 1.1.0 Hello everyone! I’m bringing a brand new version of Ribbon Tab Builder, which contains some very important updates to the UI and to the functionality of the plugin. Tab Builder has been updated internally to allow more control types to contain children, including the ability to have parent controls (SplitButton, Row and Column) within other parent controls. This means you can now insert children inside SplitButtons, and have other parent controls such as Rows and Columns to be …

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Hello! I want to share with you all a plugin I have created to make your experience while creating your custom tabs much easier and advanced than ever before.

Currently, the Ribbon interface of the Studio only allows you to create IconButtons as controls and add them to your tab. While this is fine, people often search for more customization options such as more sizing options, and other control types, such as Columns and Rows.

This is a plugin aimed to exactly give you those customization options, with an easy to use interface and a view menu allowing you to see a live view of how your controls will look like once imported.

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Tab View

Tab View

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This section allows you to view your inserted control components live. It shows you how they will look like exactly when they’re imported to your tab on the Ribbon. You can hover to see their information and click to select them to edit them on the Edit Control menu.

A selected IconButton control.

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Control Creation

Control Creation

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This section allows you to create a control, with many options allowing you to configure on how it will look and behave when inserted into your tab.

You can select which type of control you wish to insert from the “Control Type” dropdown, and even select its size from the “Control Size” dropdown. You can also enter and configure its action data through other property types, such as “Control PluginId” and “Control Category”.

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Control Options

Control Options

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This section allows you to insert a control from the options that you have set from the “Control Creation” section. It also contains a “Reset to Default” option, which will reset all the “Control Creation” options to their default values.

If you do not wish to spend time finding the necessary action data for a control you want to insert, you can use the “Load From Built-In Controls” button that will present you an “Add Tools” like page, which you can use to find every built-in control and its action data easily.

Upon selecting a control from this list, Tab Builder will automatically enter its data to the “Control Creation” menu. Which you can then use to create the control, by clicking on the “Insert Control” button.

Edit Control

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This collapsible section allows you to edit your selected control to change its certain properties. On certain control types, such as SplitButton, Column and Row, it also allows you to add a child control to the selected control.

• Show Setting Options: If the selected control is a SplitButton, this property allows the SplitButton to either use its action data, or its children for the dropdown menu.
  (Note: If you wish to insert children to the SplitButton, you must uncheck this box, which it will be by default. Checking it will not add the children data to the JSON.)
• Icon Only: This property allows you to configure whether or not the control will only show its icon on the Ribbon. This property is automatically checked for IconButtons that have their “Size” property set to “Small”.
• Control Order: This property allows you to set the order of the control, based on the parent it’s in.

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Configure Tab

Configure Tab

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This section allows you to easily remove all of the controls from your tab, or export the tab to a JSON file.
Pressing the “Export to JSON” button will open a window displaying the output JSON for your tab, which you can copy or download to your device to add it to your Studio application.

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Importing the JSON to Studio

To import the exported JSON to your Studio, go to this location on your computer:

• Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Roblox\<userID>\CustomRibbonTabs
• MacOS: ~/Documents/Roblox/<userID>/CustomRibbonTabs

And simply put the exported file (make sure to change it’s extension to .json from .lua) to this folder.

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I’m releasing this plugin for free, so everyone can enjoy creating their own custom tabs with more customization than ever before. You can suggest what changes or updates you’d like to see below.

Thanks for reading! I would greatly appreciate any and all feedback.

Made with Class++ and PluginEssentials.

[XXHEINFINIE]

When i add a child control to a lets say, a row, i cant add any more, how do i add more of them? Im clicking the row but i cant add any more buttons

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

Make sure you’re clicking on the empty space that indicates the row, not the child control itself.

[XXHEINFINIE]

I am clicking the empty space, also, for some reason i cannot add stuff to rows/collums anymore, it might be a problem on my end since my studio instalation is pretty messed up, let me restart real quick

[XXHEINFINIE]

My bad, it was only on my end, honestly, i belive this plugin is award-worthy (in my opinion)

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

I will be implementing a better error handling system soon, so you can at least have the option to restart the whole plugin without having to restart Studio. For now, you can unload your place and reload it if you encounter an error or a bug.

[XXHEINFINIE]

Sounds nice, are you perchance planning to add a way to edit already existing tabs? By dragging the json file in, if even possible in roblox?

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

You will be able to import JSON files to edit in the plugin, yes. It will most likely come in a future version of the plugin, alongside the ability to add children to SplitButtons.

[XXHEINFINIE]

@TenebrisNoctua

alongside the ability to add children to SplitButtons.

Was just about to suggest this, im guessing like the “join surfaces” and “collisions” right? Anyways, good luck with the plugin!

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

A new UI is coming soon to Tab Builder!

It will come alongside the ability to add children to SplitButtons, and more options for editing your controls.

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

Version 1.1.0

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Hello everyone! I’m bringing a brand new version of Ribbon Tab Builder, which contains some very important updates to the UI and to the functionality of the plugin.

• Tab Builder has been updated internally to allow more control types to contain children, including the ability to have parent controls (SplitButton, Row and Column) within other parent controls.
  • This means you can now insert children inside SplitButtons, and have other parent controls such as Rows and Columns to be inserted as children!
  • The only limitation is that, you cannot add Rows and Columns within each-other; While it is now possible internally, it is pretty difficult to implement UI wise, so it is limited for now.
• Updated the overall plugin design, and especially the bottom section:
  • “Control Creation” has been updated with a more consistent design that houses new and updated components. These new component designs fit the new Foundation design of Roblox Studio, which we will be seeing more throughout 2026.
  • With this update, “Load From Built-In Controls”, “Reset to Default” and “Insert Control” has been moved to another section.
• Added new section “Control Options”:
  • “Edit Control” section has been changed into a collapsible section that is now housed within the “Control Options” section.
  • The buttons mentioned above has moved into this section to allow for a better experience when creating and managing controls.
  • “Edit Control” section gains two new options:
    • “Show Setting Options”: Previously this property was being set internally for SplitButtons, now you have the option to configure this property, which allows the SplitButton to either use the action data, or the button’s children for a dropdown menu.
      (Note: If you wish to insert children to the SplitButton, you must set this property to false, which it is by default. Setting it to true will not add the children to the JSON.)
    • “Icon Only”: This property allows you to configure whether or not the control will only show its icon on the Ribbon. This property is automatically set to true for IconButtons that have their “Size” property set to “Small”.
  • “Text” option from “Edit Control” has been renamed to “Control Text” and moved to the “Control Creation” section.
• “Reset to Default” now also resets the tab name.
• “Remove all Controls” has also been updated with a better design.
• The size of the components are now more consistent, and should not look out of place when the plugin window has been resized.

[Foxplorer (dexii)]

Really love what you have made here! I wanted to install it for myself to try out but it has been taken off the store.

Is there a different way to obtain the plugin or am I missing something?

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

Yeah unfortunately for some reason it has been taken down. I’ve sent an appeal however.

[godtoer5643 (JodyWasntHere)]

I don’t see a button that will insert the divider/separator because I need it for decorate my custom tab

JSON of Separator item should be like this

{
    "Size": "Large",
    "Type": "Separator"
}

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

Select it from the control type:

[godtoer5643 (JodyWasntHere)]

oh I don’t notice the scrollbar of the control type drop down

[godtoer5643 (JodyWasntHere)]

Separator line of Ribbon Tab Builder is too bright and unable to see it in Light mode unlike Separator line of actual Ribbon bar

[kingjarek123 (Geoff_Fofferman)]

Hello! I think this plugin is really wellmade, I’ve used this for a while to recreate the old roblox studio tabs. (Before I found out you had your approach at this too.)

However, I’ve noticed some things that I feel like mentioning.

1. You cannot edit buttons after creating them. When I made a mistake of adding a button because I didn’t choose the appropiate size or type, I was forced to delete it and redo it as everything was greyed out.
2. After writing an asset id to add a custom icon for the button, the files outputted don’t actually feature these icon changes. I’ve had to resort to adding everything manually and typing it all in, which worked but was a rather longer process.
3. Some limitations still featured. When I was making the options for my bar, I’ve noticed that there were chechmarks featured like “Collisions” or “Join Surfaces” that wasn’t featured in this plugin at all.
4. Limited choices of adding buttons. You cannot actually add stuff like the textbox for changing the stud size or angles for intervals in working with parts. Nor you could add stuff that roblox featured like their own actual Insert Part button which featured it’s own split button.
5. I know this was stated before by someone else but I’ll say it here too. Cannot import json files at all. It’s kind of tiresome to have something done, realise I am missing something or studio shut down and I have to either redo it all over again or resort to editing json files manually.

Personally, it was confusing for me at first to get a start on this plugin, but the more and more I used it, the more I loved what it had to offer. I am very satisfied with this, but if you see this post here, I hope that maybe, if it’s possible that there could be changes made to add some functionality into this so it could offer more creative potential for people making their own tabs!

In conclusion, this is a very effective plugin, and I have no regrets using it!

Just incase if you’re curious: this is my Attempt of remaking the older studio client ribbon tabs.
If you don’t want me featuring this here, let me know and I will edit this part out.

[TenebrisNoctua (Noctua)]

Importing from JSON is definitely coming eventually. I want to work on this plugin when I am done porting some certain things, but I may end up delaying that at one point. Thanks for the feedback.

[kingjarek123 (Geoff_Fofferman)]

my mistake for that duplicate, quoting messed up when I wasn’t even tryna use it…
looking forward to the update when it comes so, I’m sure you busy with other stuff too anyway so that’s alright.