| Microsoft Excel is a powerful spreadsheet program; in fact, it’s the most widely used
spreadsheet program worldwide, but Excel is a lot more than just a spreadsheet program.
Unknown to many users, Excel is also a sophisticated platform for development
of custom applications. Lurking behind its mild-mannered spreadsheet disguise is a
powerful and full-featured programming language called Visual Basic for Applications (VBA).
If you have recorded and played back an Excel macro, you have used VBA—perhaps without
being aware of it.
There’s much more to VBA programming than recording macros, however. Nearly any user
can write VBA programs to perform a wide variety of tasks in Excel, ranging from the simple,
such as automating financial calculations, to the complex, such as creating a data entry
system with custom forms and data validation. Unfortunately, many users shy away from
taking advantage of Excel’s programmability because it seems too complicated, and they
cannot find a good source of information to guide them through the learning process. Excel
programming can be somewhat complicated, which is unavoidable for such a powerful tool,
but the truth is that almost any reasonably computer-literate person can learn how to program
in Excel. That’s where this book comes in handy.
About the Author
Peter G. Aitken has been writing about computers and programming for over 10 years, with some 30 books as well as hundreds of magazine and trade publication articles to his credit. His recent book titles include Visual Basic .NET Programming with Peter Aitken, Office XP Development with VBA, XML the Microsoft Way, Windows Script Host, and Teach Yourself Visual Basic .NET Internet Programming in 21 Days. For several years he was a Contributing Editor at Visual Developer Magazine where he wrote a popular Visual Basic column. He is a regular contributor to Microsoft OfficePro magazine and the DevX Web site. Peter is the proprietor of PGA Consulting, providing custom application and Internet development to business, academia, and government since 1994. |
