VB for Applications to Visual Basic

**carsto** · 09-01-2009, 12:17 PM

I have a little program I developed in Excel.
Basically there is a lookup screen where you enter an item to search for.
It finds it in a table and prints out it and all it's associated items listed in the table.

Excel isn't really the best format to accomplish this in.

I just bought MS Visual Studio Professional.
Never used it, never seen it.
Never written code in anything other than VB for Applications.

So here's the question. After learning to use this new software, how easy/difficult should it be to take the VB for Apps code, modify it to Visual Basic and create a stand alone program?

**Leith Ross** · 09-01-2009, 12:31 PM

Hello carsto,

Visual Studio is really geared more toward browsers, mobile apps, and servers. The languages are similar but not very. The syntax in Visual Studio is more system oriented than Office application specific, like VBA. You will probably still find some operations are easier in perform in one language than the other. So, it is doubtful Visual Studio will replace VBA for all your needs.

**Andy Pope** · 09-01-2009, 12:36 PM

What made you buy something that you have never seen/used. How would you know whether it was any more suitable to your task than Excel/VBA?

Did you get the .Net version of VS, if so the changes will be more pronounced.

**romperstomper** · 09-01-2009, 12:40 PM

Assuming you have bought a current version of VS (rather than VS6) then you will be using a .Net language for development. VB.Net is fairly different from VB6 or VBA although there are similarities in some of the syntax, especially if programming against an Office app.
How difficult it is to convert an Excel app to a standalone app will depend on how much of the native Excel functionality you use and therefore need to recreate.
I would say it certainly won't do you any harm to learn a .Net language, as Office will become more orientated towards it over time. That's not to say that VBA is going anywhere any time soon though!

**carsto** · 09-01-2009, 02:03 PM

why I purchased this...
I've been wanting to learn to program for quite some time but never completed the research to start learning.

I had the opportunity to purchase new unopened legal software at less than 20% retail but had just a couple days to decide what sotfware to purchase.
I chose MS Visual Studio Professional because it said you could develope software solutions for a variety of platforms and write in several different languages. It seemed versatile enough to risk spending a small amount of money to get me started.

the rest of the story...
Just to see if I could do it in Excel, I wrote this little program for my employer about 2 years ago to replace some (truely obsolete & problematic) custom software they have. Just prior to completion they said I should stop working on it, they had a new plan, which never materialized. Well, today we're out shopping for replacement software, probably custom again! My thought was maybe I could learn fast & modify what I have to save them some money.

It really has nothing to do with Excel. It uses no native Excel functions. It does no calculations. The only Excel-like portion is the database tables! It uses several Userforms to search the tables for data or to build the tables. Then it actually finds other non Excel files and prints them.
My boss thinks I can do anything he asks me to do. I keep telling him I'm not an Excel, Crystal, ____ (you name it) wiz. But so far "snow em and learn fast" has been workin for me! I suspect I might be putting myself in way over my head this time, so I thought I'd get some opinions.

Thanks for your input.

**romperstomper** · 09-01-2009, 03:31 PM

You might well find that it doesn't require a lot of tweaking to get it working in VB.Net although you wouldn't be using the full power of .Net - Windows forms for example have a lot more power than userforms do. There are some quite good walkthroughs in the VS Help.
And I can sympathise about your boss - my last one figured that because I could use Excel, it would be easy for me to become a network admin, DBA and Exchange Server admin amongst other things...