Office Client Developer Content and Resources : Excel

Developer Help Updates for Office 2010 Beta

dhale — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 23:58:00 GMT

In the intervening time between when we had to hand-off the Developer References to go into the Office 2010 Beta several weeks ago and now, the Office Developer Documentation team has been extremely busy adding new content about the new features. We have added hundreds of new topics to the references!

This post describes to Office VBA developers how to make sure they are viewing the most up to date version of the developer help for the Office 2010 client applications.

Please Pardon Our Dust!

As we gear up for the release of Office 2010, we are excited about the improvements we are making to how we deliver content updates via the Office Web site. However, as a result of that work, for the Beta we are only able to provide developer help in the “offline” mode (that is, the content is viewed locally from your hard drive). Don’t worry though, online refreshes of the developer help content will be up and running for the final release of Office 2010!

How to Update Developer Help

If you are a VBA developer and would like to have the latest Office 2010 Beta developer reference, just follow the steps below to update. These steps describe how to download the latest files (.HxS files), install them, and view them.

1. Download the reference(s) from Office 2010: Developer References and extract them to a location on your computer. The download contains help builds for the following developer help content:

Combined Office 2010 developer references (All of the below)
Access 2010 Developer Reference (MSACCESS.DEV.HXS)
Excel 2010 Developer Reference (EXCEL.DEV.HXS)
Outlook 2010 Developer Reference (OUTLOOK.DEV.HXS)
PowerPoint 2010 Developer Reference (POWERPNT.DEV.HXS)
Project 2010 Developer Reference (WINPROJ.DEV.HXS)
Publisher 2010 Developer Reference (MSPUB.DEV.HXS)
Visio 2010 Automation Reference (VISIO.DEV.HXS)
Visio 2010 ShapeSheet Reference (VISIO.SHAPSHEET.HXS)
Word 2010 Developer Reference (WINWORD.DEV.HXS)

2. Make sure to close any open Office 2010 Beta applications.

3. Copy the extracted HxS file(s) into the directory where Office 2010 Beta installed them. For a computer running 32-bit Windows, typically the location is:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office14\1033

For a computer running 32-bit Office on 64-bit Windows, typically the location is

C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office14\1033

You should overwrite the existing versions of the files.

Viewing the Updated Help

Start the application for which you have updated the developer help file. Press F1 to open the client help viewer.

Make sure that you are viewing the local copy of help by ensuring that Developer Reference under Content from This Computer is selected for your client help viewer (shown below). You can now view the help you downloaded using the client help viewer.

Tip: Make sure you display the Tablet of Contents by clicking the little book icon in the toolbar of the client help viewer. It makes browsing the developer help much more intuitive.

A Final Note

In addition to the developer help, you can find dozens of articles, code samples, videos, and more showing you how to work with the awesome developer features in Office 2010 Beta on the Office Developer Center.

Technorati Tags: Office Development,VBA,Developer Documentation,Office 2010 Beta

Open XML SDK 1.0 Available

dhale — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 01:26:00 GMT

Just read fantastic news from Erika Ehrli Cabral that the Open XML SDK 1.0 is now available. She writes:

"The Open XML Format SDK Technology Preview simplifies the task of manipulating Open XML packages. The Open XML Application Programming Interface (API) encapsulates many common tasks that developers perform on Open XML packages, so you can perform complex operations with just a few lines of code. Using this API, you can programmatically generate and manipulate Word 2007 documents, Excel 2007 spreadsheets, and PowerPoint 2007 presentations. The programming model uses managed code, so it's safe for server-side scenarios.

The Open XML Format SDK also provides how-to articles and reference documentation that can help you get started with Open XML programming."

See her post for details on where to download.

Microsoft Office Excel 2007 VBA Reference Feedback

Siosalach — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 22:23:00 GMT

Greetings.

My name is Rod Chisholm and I am the Programming Writer for Excel client VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) and Programmability. Our reference material is available in the box, on MSDN, and NOW on Office Online. This gives us the unique opportunity to gather ratings and feedback from our users to help strengthen our topics, and improve the help experience overall. As my manager, David Hale pointed out early this month in Let's Talk about Office VBA Help, Excel is ranked in the top three for hit counts on Office Online. So we are certainly getting traction and visibility. From all those hits approximately 1 out of 100 leaves a rating. Of those, about 1 out of 5 leaves a comment. With comments, there is less guess work as to why a topic gets attention, so the more, the merrier.

Are we listening?

Yes we are! For those who think that comments are dropped into a black hole, let me assure you that I have reviewed all the data and comments since the launch of Office 2007. Although there were a vast number of comments, most could be categorized in five or six areas. The areas of interest to me were the requests for codes samples, and the “how-to”, or “how do I” feedback. Both are key indicators that the reference material in these areas should be where time is invested. So, thank you for participating. You are making a difference.

Here is a breakdown of some trends and areas of focus for content improvement, based on site hits and your comments (special thank you to Mike Stowe, Access Programming Writer for help with data analysis):

Top Object Hits

Huge generators of site hits include Range, Application, Worksheet, Sheets, Workbook and Worksheets to no surprise. These Objects are used most frequently and essential to workbook navigation.

Top Member Hits

To me it looks like a pretty even distribution of hits, but the common denominator here is Range making up 10 of the Top 20. Range will be a primary focus for content ideas moving forward.

Top "How to" Topics

The bottom line is that Range and how to navigate within a worksheet seem to be the heavy favorites when it comes to hit counts and comments. So, look forward to content improvements, more code samples and additional topics around hot areas of Excel. Until next time, please keep the feedback coming. I'm listening.

For more information check out the Excel Developer Portal and the Excel Team Blog.

Please post a comment if you have any questions or concerns.

Cheers.

RdC ~Excel