Writing Excel Macros with VBA, 2nd Edition

Chapter 9. Object Models

In this chapter, we present a general overview of object models and the syntax used to manipulate them in code.

As we have discussed, VBA is the programming language that underlies several important Windows applications, including Microsoft Excel, Word, Access, PowerPoint, Visual Basic, and, in Office 2000, Outlook. Any application that uses VBA in this way is called a host application . We also discussed the fact that each host application enhances VBA by providing an object model (perhaps more than one) to deal with the objects that are particular to that application.

Microsoft provides over a dozen different object models for its Office application suite and related products. These include object models for Excel, Word, Access, DAO (Data Access Objects), Outlook, PowerPoint, Binder, Graph, Forms, VBA, VB, ASP (Active Server Pages), and more. Of course, our interest in this book is with the Excel object model, and we will devote most of the rest of the book to describing the major portions of this model. (We will also discuss a portion of the Office object model in the chapter on customizing Excel menus and toolbars.)

Objects, Properties, and Methods

In the parlance of VBA programming, an object is something that is identified by its properties and its methods. For example, workbooks, worksheets, charts, and fonts are all examples of objects in the Excel object model. Actually, the Excel object model contains 192 different objects, including several hidden ...