I hit my first stumbling block when building out the architecture for the new SharePoint 2010 site. I don’t like the default publishing page, so I figured I’d go in and delete the areas on the page that were hogging the entire space. No go. These are fixed areas that can’t be deleted or moved.

I tried everything I could think of… change the page type, look for web part zones, delete the areas. Nope. This 2010 thing is a real beast. I hit twitter to see what I could find out.

Within a matter of minutes, John Ross and Randy Drisgill jumped in. Read from the bottom of this one to follow the thread.

Oh, no! I’m going to have to change all of my SharePoint habits because of this new Ribbon thing-a-ma-jig. Evidently I’m not the only one. Even Michael Doyle, aka SharePoint Ninja, is flailing a bit.

So I started poking around on the Ribbon, and sure enough, there it was: The Page Layout Button.

I’m still not crazy about the hoops I had to jump through to get there. I’ve gotten used to my old rocking chair, SharePoint 2007. Guess I’m going to have to learn some new tricks. I’ll keep you posted.