Excel Add-in Development in C/C++: Applications in Finance (The Wiley Finance Series) [Hardcover]

Steve Dalton (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0470024690 | ISBN-13: 978-0470024690 | Publication Date: December 15, 2004

Excel is the industry standard for financial modelling, providing a number of ways for users to extend the functionality of their own add-ins, including VB. C/C++. Excel Add-in Development in C/C++ - Applications for Finance is a how-to guide and reference book for the creation of high performance add-ins for Excel in C and C++ for users in the finance industry. Author Steve Dalton explains how to apply Excel add-ins to financial applications with many examples given throughout the book. It covers the relative strengths and weaknesses of developing add-ins for Excel in VB versus C/C++.

"This book is for anyone who wants to do any application development in Excel. Even for an old hand at Excel development such as myself, a brief skim through reveals valuable nuggets of information. Delving deeper into the text, richer veins are easily found. This book is destined to become an essential reference on Excel development."
Dr. Les Clewlow, Principal, Lacima Group Ltd.

"Programming Excel add-ins using the C API can be complex and difficult. Steve has done a masterful job of demystifying the process. After reading this book you'll be creating XLLs for all purposes with complete confidence. Highly recommended."
Rob Bovey, MCSE, MCSD, Excel MVP, President, Application Professionals

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Programming Excel add-ins using the C API can be complex and difficult. Steve has done a masterful job of demystifying the process. After reading this book you'll be creating XLLs for all purposes with complete confidence. Highly recommended."--Rob Bovey, MCSE, MCSD, Excel MVP, President, Application Professionals

"This book is for anyone who wants to do any application development in Excel. Even for an old hand at Excel development such as myself, a brief skim through reveals valuable nuggets of information. Delving deeper into the text, richer veins are easily found. This book is destined to become an essential reference on Excel development."--Dr. Les Clewlow, Principal, Lacima Group Ltd.

From the Back Cover

Excel Add-in Development in C/C++: Applications in Finance is a must-buy book for any serious Excel developer. Excel is the industry standard for financial modelling, providing a number of ways for users to extend the functionality of their own add-ins, including VB. C/C++. This is the only complete how-to guide and reference book for the creation of high performance add-ins for Excel in C and C++ for users in the finance industry. Steve Dalton explains how to apply Excel add-ins to financial applications with many examples given throughout the book. It also covers the relative strengths and weaknesses of developing add-ins for Excel in VB versus C/C++, and provides comprehensive code, workbooks and example projects on the accompanying CD-ROM. Excel Add-in Development in C/C++ features:

• Extensive example codes in VB, C and C++, explaining all the ways in which a developer can achieve their objectives.
• Example projects that demonstrate, from start to finish, the potential of Excel when powerful add-ins can be easily developed.
• Develops the readers understanding of the relative strengths and weaknesses of developing add-ins for Excel in VB versus C/C++.
• A CD-ROM with several thousand lines of example code, numerous workbooks, and a number of complete example projects.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 422 pages
• Publisher: Wiley (December 15, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470024690
• ISBN-13: 978-0470024690
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,325,010 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Making Excell do what it Doesn't Want to Do, February 23, 2005

By 

John Matlock "Gunny" (Winnemucca, NV) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Excel Add-in Development in C/C++: Applications in Finance (The Wiley Finance Series) (Hardcover)

This book is written for people who have the need to make Excel do things it doesn't really want to do, or do them faster, more cleanly, more flexibly. It presumes a reasonable grasp of basic software development concepts. A solid C and/or C++ foundation skill, a good working knowledge of Excel, and at least some experience with VBA is needed.

The basic applications given in the book center around financial modelling but this represents a rather small part of the book. The concepts and techniques described in most of the book are about working to enhance and extend Excell functionality. These techniques would be aplicable to quite a number of application areas even including real time data capture and analysis.

Building add-ins for Excel is an area that has not been covered very well in the literature. This book is a coherent explanation of the relevant technoloby, what steps to follow, what pitfalls to avoid, and a good reference guide.

The CD-ROM includes several thousand lines of example code, numerous workbooks, and a number of complete example projects.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars ONLY book detailed on the Excel C API, February 1, 2006

By 

ET "ET" (Singapore) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Excel Add-in Development in C/C++: Applications in Finance (The Wiley Finance Series) (Hardcover)

This is the ONLY book that is written exclusively for the Excel C API. It is well written but the reader needs to have basic C knowledge first. Development of XLLs in C++ is a topic not well documented in litertaure except for the MSDN website which has an archived section on the Excel 97 SDK. In any case, the CD code that comes with the book helps a lot. For a quick start to build your own programs you may use some interface classes and headers from the CD.

Several quants purchase a separate software XLL+ for developing the Excel XLLs, but even the software is a series of headers and cpp files made easy. And when it comes to more complicated development like dialog or menus, the book is a useful reference.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very useful, June 9, 2005

By 

bookreader99 (London, uk) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Excel Add-in Development in C/C++: Applications in Finance (The Wiley Finance Series) (Hardcover)

It may be true that a lot, defintely not all, of the information can be found in various places on the internet, but the sources are all over the place, incomplete and often refer to older technologies. The book contains much more than just the bland facts from various sources. For a start, the fact that all of this information is in one reference is extremely valuable. (I bought hardcopy, which I much prefer for reference and reading). The book is full of practical help and notes so that you don't have to find out the hard way where the undocumented problems are. There are worked sections on name handling and multi-threading. There are well-presented discussions about memory management, data types and handling large data structures. I work in finance but still think that I would have found this book useful even if I was working in another industry where high-speed number crunching is important. I was able to write xll add-ins after a weekend when it would have taken perhaps months otherwise.