Customer Reviews

Visual Basic for Applications Unleashed

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Very useful for me in some unanticipated areas: Introduction to API and Registry concepts; Command bar manipulation; Error handling and debugging strategies; Web topics; Appendices and the HTML Primer. Word's potential as an Automation client was not well represented. It is curious that an application so rich in objects, methods, properties, and constants receives such scant treatment when it appears to this user to be the ideal client for interface with users in the automated programs I am developing which involve database and file manipulation tasks. But the author treated the VB language well enough to provide the basic tools for discovery. Coming from a position of no formal computer or programming training, the code examples were especially concise and useful, and aptly illustrated the topics. The lack of typographic and grammatical errors was refreshing. Because of its strong, cohesive content, and good text editing, the book was a good read, and substantially increased my development skills in both grasping the big picture and working the details.

I finished this book in 14 days and learned a lot on the introductory of VBA in Office 97. I gave it 4 stars was because it did not cover a lot on database programming. It is a good book for those guys who wanted to perform 'Automation' in Office 97.

Why I've bought this book? I have read the comments of others who previously bought it and what convinced me was the fact that it was based more on Excel than on other MSOffice apps. This is what i was looking for. Unfortunately there are not many books on VBA for Office 97, and what exists is either too complex for a beginner or way too easy. I haven't finished the book yet, but for my own purposes is excellent and really straightforward to read. I have learned something new from the very first chapter of the book.

As a developer, i did not find the book too useful. there was too much of a spin on Excel and too little on Word and Access. database development is the root of integrated applications. why so little attention on access? Case in point-on page 282 & 283, you failed to describe in detail what is going on in your sample code. code related to excel recieved more attention.

I found this book to explicitly cover the basics of building a solid foundation in object programming. Other books I have read provide a great introduction for the beginner who has only recorded macros. If you want a serious and in-depth guide from an overview of the absolute basics to the specifics of the MS Office object model, this is your tome.

I got this book to write some VBA in Word97. 32 out of the 900+ pages are devoted to exactly that... almost. The problem is that this book doesn't give you the definitions of the objects and their parameters, so it's like trying to learn to speak (or write) a languange without a dictionary. Lots more examples for Excel and Access. Interesting that the object SELECTION is referenced under the section devoted to RANGE, when Woody Leonhard of the Annoyances series of books says SELECTION is superior (in Word, at least.) Also very few examples of using the code. I might be able to figure out the definitions by watching what the code does, but without examples.... Excel people will have better luck.

Book teaches both concept and practice. The book is pricey, given the shallowness in its level of detail. Book would be excellent reference for person in receptionist position with organization. Good introduction to VBA, clearly written. Book should have a graphic of each MS Application's object heirarchy. Book needs more in depth description of Object Browser.

If you're looking for an in-depth object heirarchy for different MS applications, you're going to be disappointed in this book. However, if you're looking for a solid introduction to VBA, you've come to the right place. Unlike some other programming books where authors think that they have to use a 4-page code example simply to introduce a new function or statement, the author here gives examples that are short and illustrate the point perfectly. The book is written in plain English and is the easiest to understand VB/VBA-related book I've seen. Don't let the title fool you. Even if you're a novice VB programmer who's gotten the art of drawing forms and controls down and just need a good overview of the language, since VB & VBA use the same language syntax, this book will do you just as well. Advanced VBA programmers will probably get little out of this book, but definiately recommended for the beginner to intermediate programmer.

It was what I was looking for. The perfect book for users like me who had passed from Access Programming and wanted to get into Office's Objects world. Also in Outlook, with the right ammount of APIs for getting interested and buy more books. You read all the 963 pages easily, all of them without skipping.

I would definitely recommend this book if you use Office 97 on a regular/daily basis and want to learn how to program individual applications to get your work done faster. I've picked up a couple of 1000 page books on Office that barely touch on the subject, but this book goes into it in much more detail. This is actually the first bok that explained the topic of OLE Automation in a way that I could understand and use it. Probably not for the advanced VBA programmer, but well writen and definitely recommended for beginning to intermediate users.