#Microsoft excel 2011 open vba window how to#
#Microsoft excel 2011 open vba window code#

In general, the answer to the question of when to use VBA is the same as when to use any feature in the Microsoft Office programs-use it when itвЂ™s the simplest solution for the task at hand. Or, to take things further, you might also use VBA to create customizations or automation for your documents and templates, such as custom dialog boxes that can help users complete form documents.

#Microsoft excel 2011 open vba window code#

As you saw in a couple of simple examples in the Excel chapters of this book, you can often use a single line of code to save substantial time or even do things you canвЂ™t do through the features in the user interface. Of course, this timesaving example is just one of several types of situations where you can benefit from VBA. As you can imagine, learning VBA no longer seemed like a crazy idea to her. The task would have taken about six minutes instead of six hours. But then I told her that if she had known some basic VBA (just part of what youвЂ™ll learn in this primer, by the way), she could have accounted for most of the differences among her tables in one macro and then formatted all of them at once. In reply to her question, I asked if she knew any VBA, and she looked at me as if I were insane. She had created a few table styles and even recorded a macro for some of the formatting, but she still had click into each table to apply them and then manually take care of any unique elements for each table. At just over seven minutes per table, that isnвЂ™t bad, but she wanted to know if there was a way she could have done it more quickly. The task took her, a power user, about six hours. It was a Word document containing 50 tables copied from Excel that needed to be cleaned up and reformatted. the night before cleaning up tables for a report that was due that day. One of my favorite examples of when and why to use VBA if youвЂ™re not a programmer came up one evening at dinner with a friend. Once youвЂ™re comfortable with Word VBA, you can apply all of the basics you learn to VBA tasks in PowerPoint and Excel as well. Because Word is the primary document production program for Microsoft Office, most examples throughout this primer use Word VBA. However, because this chapter assumes that this is your first introduction to writing VBA (or writing any programming language, for that matter), it uses one program for most examples, to avoid the confusion of trying to cover too much too fast. So, the majority of what youвЂ™ll learn in this primer will apply to macros you may want to write in any of these programs. Keep in mind that VBA is just an additional way to work with, and expand the capabilities of, the programs you already know.Д«eyond the program-specific feature and task names, most VBA language and structure is virtually identical across Word, PowerPoint, and Excel. Nearly all elements of VBA that are specific to a program are the names of features and tasks you already know from using that program. But the most important discovery was how much of the VBA language I already knew just from being an advanced Microsoft Office user. I discovered how easy it is and how much you can do with VBA even with just a basic level of knowledge. If you can learn to format a table, create styles, or create fields in Word to write formulas or generate charts in Excel or to customize masters in PowerPoint, you can learn VBA.ДЄfter years of avoiding VBA because it seemed technical and scary, I fell head over heels one day after I had no choice but to venture into the Visual Basic Editor for a client. Yes, I use VBA and Office Open XML to develop solutions for clients, but that just means IвЂ™m taking advantage of all the tools that Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel have to offer for creating documents. The fact is that you donвЂ™t have to be a programmer to make effective use of VBA (or Office Open XML, as discussed in Chapter 24). IвЂ™m not a programmer, so I wonвЂ™t treat you like one. This thorough primer on Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) is written for advanced Microsoft Office users, not for programmers. If you have any concerns about venturing into this chapter, take a deep breath and relax. Get tips and guidance on ways to apply VBA basics for accomplishing a wide range of tasks

#Microsoft excel 2011 open vba window how to#

Learn how to read and understand VBA codeДiscover the core basics of how to write your own macros Explore the benefits of working with VBA code