Excel 2003 VBA Programmer's Reference (Programmer to Programmer) (Paperback)

~ Paul T. Kimmel (Author), Stephen Bullen (Author), John Green (Author), Rob Bovey (Author), Robert Rosenberg (Author), Brian Patterson (Contributor) "Excel's macro recorder operates very much like the recorder that stores the greeting on your telephone answering machine..." (more)
Key Phrases: recognizer class, fill formatting options, count property returns, End Sub, Public Sub, Visual Basic (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

What is this book about?

Excel 2003 VBA Programmer's Reference is an updated and expanded version of the two previous editions now with a reference section downloadable from the Web for easy perusal. The book is aimed at Excel users who want to gain more control over their spreadsheets using VBA or who want to develop Excel applications for other users. The book starts with a primer chapter focused on bringing the readers up to speed with Excel and VBA. From there, the book expands to focus on major issues faced by advanced Excel users and developers.

What does this book cover?

In this book, you'll discover how to do the following:

• Set up applications and convert them to add-ins
• Package and distribute Excel applications
• Set up interaction with other Office applications and databases
• Program the VB Editor and use the Windows API
• Use VB6 and VB.NET with Excel
• Set up internationalization
• Advanced debugging and error handling techniques

From the Back Cover

If you’re an Excel user seeking more control over your spreadsheets, or if you are developing Excel applications for others, this comprehensive volume provides what you need to maximize VBA flexibility in the Excel environment. Fully revised and updated, it focuses exclusively on VBA for Excel and provides appropriate information for beginners, Excel programmers, and advanced developers alike.

Packed with examples, code, and screenshots where applicable, this clearly organized reference meets you at the level of your experience and takes you to the next level. From a complete Excel VBA primer to internationalization, advanced debugging techniques, and programming the VB editor, this is your one-stop reference for Excel VBA programming.

What you will learn from this book

• Object-oriented theory and VBA for Excel
• Ways to set up applications and convert them to add-ins
• How to use VB6 and VB.NET with Excel
• Programming to the Windows® API
• Advanced error handling and debugging methods
• Essentials of SQL® as it applies to accessing data with ADO
• Interaction with other Office applications and databases
• How to access extensive reference material in downloadable, searchable format

Who this book is for

This book is for Excel users and programmers from beginning to advanced. You need a reasonable working knowledge of Excel and a full installation of the software.

Wrox Programmer’s References are designed to give the experienced developer straight facts on a new technology, without hype or unnecessary explanations. They deliver hard information with plenty of practical examples to help you apply new tools to your development projects today.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 1176 pages
• Publisher: Wrox; 1 edition (July 9, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0764556606
• ISBN-13: 978-0764556609
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.4 x 2.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #96,581 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #16 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Microsoft > Development > VBA
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

67 of 69 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A great book destroyed, October 1, 2004

By	Simon Jones (London, England) - See all my reviews

Sorry for the length of the review, but don't make the same mistake I did by buying this book.

When I buy a book, I buy it for its content, which I assume is accurate, complete, timely and written by authors I trust and respect. The content of this book is neither accurate nor complete, doesn't cover the major additions to Excel 2003 and appears to have been updated solely by a new author unknown in the Excel developer community.

If I want support, I'll ask my questions in the Excel newsgroups, where I'm confident they'll be answered by someone who actually knows Excel and uses it daily.

I've had the 2002 version of this book sitting on my desk for a year or so and I find myself regularly refering to it. For me, the first half of the book containing the narrative about VBA is the best bit and much more useful than the object model listing in the appendices. When I read (on Amazon.co.uk) that the appendices were now downloadable and had been replaced by more than 400 pages of new material, I immediately ordered this update. I was expecting lots more of the same information-packed writing I'd enjoyed in the 2002 version, covering the topics mentioned above, such as "Object-oreinted theory and VBA", "How to use VB6 and VB.NET" and "Advanced error handling and debugging methods". All great stuff!

Unfortunately, NONE of that is actually in the book! The object model appendices have NOT been removed, are NOT downloadable or searchable and have NOT been replaced by new material! I can only think that the 'Editorial Reviews' on this page were written from an initial outline that the authors didn't deliver.

Already disappointed by it not matching the sales patter, I began to read the book, only to find that the four authors of the 2002 version (Bovey, Bullen, Green and Rosenberg) didn't actually contribute to this update! The new author, Kimmel, seems to have done the update by himself - and it shows!

As far as I can see, there are three new chapters. The first is a totally impenetrable and theoretical one about Objects, interfaces, polymorphism, inheritance and lots of other jibberish - with nothing relating that to VBA or how we might use it. The second is a basic chapter about debugging and testing (certainly not the "Advanced debugging and error handling techniques" promised). The other new chapter is about XML, which mostly repeats the old material in the "Excel and the Internet" chapter, says that Excel 2003 and can now open and save xml files (with File > Open), but completely omits anything about mapping XML elements to cells using the new 'XML Source' task pane! Those three chapters have been added without increasing the page count much, so the rest of the chapters have been 'edited' to make room - often by deleting those little bits of information essential to applying the concepts to our own code. His edits also included removing all the variable naming conventions from the example code!

Kimmel has also restructured the book, so instead of the 'gradual increase in complexity' approach of the 2002 version, he's put all the 'theoretical' chapters up front - so we learn about writing userforms, database access, the windows API etc before we learn how to open a workbook or select a range! I can only think that C. Walker's review was about the 2002 version, because his comment of "with every chapter the level of learning increases" certainly doesn't apply in my opinion.

The biggest problem with this edition, though, is that Kimmel obviously knows nothing about Excel. There are so many errors, inaccuracies and incompleteness that I'm amazed it passed the editing stage. Surely anyone can spot the error in his tip of closing addins from the Immediate window using the command:

AddinWorkbooks("TheAddin.xls").Close

I guess he didn't know whether to use the Addins or Workbooks collections, so used both! And wouldn't that be an 'xla' extension?

Bottom line: Do NOT buy this book. If you have the 2002 version, there's nothing extra worth having, and lots of new errors to stumble over. If you don't have the 2002 version, buy that version instead of this. Everything in it applies equally to Excel 2003, and the biggest new additions in Excel 2003 (XML Mapping and the VB.NET integration) aren't mentioned in this version anyway.

And if you're like me and want to read more from the original four authors, a new book by them has just appeared on Amazon.com - Professional Excel Development - due out in February. I can't wait!

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Everything is Here, Organization a bit confusing., November 22, 2004

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

This huge (1176 page) book is intended for Excel users and programmers from beginning to advanced, this book presumes you have a reasonable working knowledge of excel and a full installation of the software. It does not presume that you have a working knowledge of VBA, after all, that's it's subject.

In fact, chapter 1 is titled Primer in Excel VBA. Excel VBA is, of course, a specialized version of Microsoft's standard VBA, where those specific points that cater to spread sheet manipulation are differrent from the VBA's associated with other parts of the Microsoft Office package.

This book gives a general introduction to VBA, but it is entirely within the context of Excel. This is indeed a Primer. It starts with how you open the Visual Basic Editor and goes on from there. Generally the book grows step by step. But not always. ==On page 83 it says: "OnTime - You can use the OnTime method to schedule a macro to run sometime in the future." OK, I understand this. But only 7 pages later it says: "VBA does support interface polymorphism. Interface polymorphism is orthogonal to class polymorphism." Huh? Does this help me schedule something to run in the future? Is this supposed to mean anything at all to me? Since I have no idea what it's talking about am I supposed to go look up all these new words somewhere? Is this really going to help me? Anyway, you skip a few chapters and you're back into getting some useful information about things like creating user forms.

All in all I rate the book quite high. Everything you always wanted to know is there. And it is supposed to be a reference manual, not a tutorial. My only complaint is that I think it could have organized a bit better.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Just bad writing, August 12, 2006

By	S. McCloskey "sean1000" (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is very poorly written and badly organized. Essential introductory topics are sprinkled throughout the book seemingly randomly. Much of the writing is horribly ambiguous or just plain unreadable. I am a beginning programmer, though I am highly proficient with Excel. I was lucky to be familiar with some other programming languages because the explanations of object-oriented programming concepts in this book (as well as other topics covered) would have been completely incomprehensible without a moderate level of background experience. The examples in the book are neither practical, nor particularly well designed to illustrate the VBA concepts that the authors are trying to teach. Instead, the authors seem to be preoccupied with designing examples to convey stylistic programming conventions that they personally favor.