Excel 2003 Programming: A Developer's Notebook

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That’s the grand vision, but even if you don’t intend to install SharePoint or build a web-based interface to your business processes, you can still make use of the new Excel features. Table 1-1 is a guide to the new Excel features, where they are located in this book, and how to use them.

Note

Is Excel 2003 a big deal? On the surface, not much has changed— there are a handful of new objects and the user interface of Excel is largely the same. Underneath that are fundamental shifts implied by the new features: Lists, XML, web services, .NET, and InfoPath build a framework for entirely new ways to exchange data with Excel.

Table 1-1. Guide to Excel 2003 features

Feature	Look here	Use to
Workspaces and lists	Chapter 2	Share workbooks and ranges of cells. Sort and filter ranges of cells. Control user access to shared items.
XML	Chapter 3	Transform spreadsheets into HTML and other formats. Transform XML data files into workbooks. Map XML data to ranges of cells.
Web services	Chapter 4	Get dynamic results from the Web. Control remote components, such as SharePoint lists, through VBA code.
.NET programmability	Chapter 5	Build .NET components to use from Excel. Work with Excel from VB.NET. Create Excel .NET applications.
Security	Chapter 6	Password-protect workbooks and ranges. Control user access to ranges. Restrict permissions on workbooks. Digitally sign workbooks and macros. Distribute Excel security settings.
InfoPath	Chapter 7	Create XML data ...