I want to ask about something, that can probably get pretty complex. I'm working on an interactive presentation with some game elements (stuff that use variables, a timer, score, etc.) and I've noticed that any changes a macro makes (changing the string in a text box, disabling certain shapes) when you run a slide show remain after the slide show has finished. Given that the presentation and the games therein are made to be played multiple times, I would like to avoid having the user click "Undo" a million times or closing and opening the presentation again. I am not sure how to go about this, but I've had a few ideas:
The first one was to track every change that's being made, while the game is running and then have a macro use the "Undo" command the required number of times, once the slideshow is stopped. Creating an Event Handler however proved to be rather complicated. I'm not that well versed in VBA and reading how many declarations, classes and whatnot have to be made, the fact that I cannot find in the reference what the Event for simply ending the slideshow is (that is, when the user presses Esc, not when the last slide has been reached) not to mention the fact that it's very easy to make a mistake that can render all of that code useless, makes me think this is needlessly complicated just for a single event.
Another idea was to set the initial values of the properties that are to be changed during the game, along with the needed variables at the start of the game, so that no matter what changes are made in the presentation, the values will always be reset when running it, although that would make it tedious to tweak things and make big changes to the game, when needed.
Can you give me some suggestions on how I should go about this problem? Which method would be better? Is there some way to make it so that nothing a macro does during a slide show makes actual changes to the presentation itself? I'd very much like to hear your thoughts.
Thanks!
Related
I have a database where I don't want some fields showing depending on data in other fields. I'm still new to VBA, having learnt how to do things I need via the internet (there's not much call for it in my job so like to try it out on side projects) for the things I need and have managed to create some code that hides certain fields that aren't needed, depending on what's been entered in another field and that works okay, if not perfectly (I'd like it to only work on the current record and not all of them at once but will worry about that later). My problem is, if I'm entering information onto a record and any of those fields become invisible exactly as I would want them to, then if I have more records to complete and load a new record, those hidden fields are also hidden on the blank record before any data has been entered and I want each new record to show all fields from the outset.
Another thing I've noticed is that if I close the database, next time I go into it the hidden fields have unhidden themselves again so I know I'm missing something important.
Here's a screenshot of a bit of the code where I want 2 other fields (What_reason and Date_sent_to_new_owning_School) to be visible depending on whether the answer in the current field after update is "Standard" or "Non-standard":
I'm sorry if this is really entry-level stuff but I AM entry level and trying to learn. This bit does work, albeit not perfectly as I'd like it to only work on the record I'm in at the time, and not go through and hide that field in all the other records at once (which it's doing).
I've searched everywhere but can't find the answer and although I've tried, I'm nowhere near good enough at VBA to try and use common sense to work it out. Is this something that can be done? I'm okay with computers generally and with Access too but I'm aware there's an awful lot I don't know and this is why I'm trying to do new things and learn stuff that I've not used before. I have tried all day to get this to work but am admitting defeat and am hoping somebody here will be able to help me. I'll probably need 'idiot level' advice if that's possible, I know my limitations. :)
Do you know how to use the Event tab in the Property Sheet? You can set all of your fields to [field].Visible = True on either: On Current, On Load, or On Open
Screenshot of the Property Sheet and for the field that determines the visibility of all of the other fields; you can use the Event: After Update so that way when you click/tab away from that field, it'll make those changes for you!
Property setting affects ALL instances of control. Control will be visible/not visible for all records depending on conditions of current record. Therefore, dynamically hiding controls on form set in Continuous or Datasheet will NOT give the desired result of
only work on the current record and not all of them at once
Db is not going to 'remember' dynamic setting - code needs to be executed when form opens and/or navigating records - so it is needed in OnCurrent event as well as control's AfterUpdate.
Conditional Formatting can dynamically enable/disable textbox/combobox by record although control is still visible.
There are a half-dozen answers to this. "Open a second instance" "Have a pause" Etc. I'm not looking for that.
I'm looking for the user of the workbook to be able to manipulate the workbook while the macro is running. I've seen this working before, where the user could scroll around, change tabs, even add and remove data, all while the macro was running. Unfortunately, I couldn't get permission to look at the code (And committing CFAA violations ins't my cup of tea), so I have no idea how they did it.
How can you enable a user to edit the workbook as macros are running? For a specific example, I have Conway's Game of Life running. Users select cells to flip live/dead, then can run a macro to run the entire thing. I think it'd be nice for users to be able to change cells as the macro is running. (which is a second on select macro)
Thank you
Sorry just reread the question. I wouldn't expect the permutation to run for very long - not long enough to interrupt really.
But if it does, then the advice about using lots of DoEvents stands.
The other option is that you can use the OnTime event to have a "heartbeat"
VBA Macro On Timer style to run code every set number of seconds, i.e. 120 seconds
You can set the timer to say 3 seconds. Every time the OnTime event occurs you do one step of your permutation. In the three seconds in between they can edit.
Refactor your macro to use Events. In which case, you would have a series of event handlers (instead of one monolithic macro) to respond to various triggers. This is assuming that the macro is influenced by what the user is doing in the worksheet.
One way of (sort of) doing this is to use a Modeless Userform (UserForm.Show vbModeless)
The user form stays visible but the VBA stops running when the form is shown and the user can then interact with Excel. Then when the user clicks a button on the form the code behind the button starts running again.
So in reality the user is either interacting with Excel or interacting with the form ...
I have code stuck.
It might be in an infinite loop.
Not sure.
Is there a way to break the program to stop at the current line of code that it is running on?
I'd like to avoid shutting down excel because I want to be able to catch where in the loop it is, and by going into the code, I will be able to tell how much processing was done. I would like to break into the code, if possible.
It is stuck on hour glass.
Ctrl+Break doesn't seem to work
Seems like the running code has hijacked all the quota that cpu is giving to excel.
If there is nothing I can do now, is there something in the future I can do to where I can more easily break into the code?
I'm thinking that an intermittent wait within a loop might be a feasible solution.
In the future, include a DoEvents inside the loop. It will run a little slower, but you will be able to use Ctrl+Break to stop it from running.
Create a progress dialog when entering the loop and include a Cancel button. Within your loop check for the Cancel signal/event. This also gives you some flexibility on how you react to the Cancel - you could stop the loop and display key information in a new dialog box (for example).
Basic steps to achieve what I have described (not necessarily the most elegant or the most re-useable, but simple enough for those of lesser experience):
create a modeless (not modal) Form with either suitable labels or a progressbar item (for
visual effect). Include a public property (Boolean) for Cancel (e.g.
boolCancel)
Place a button on form and onClick set boolCancel = True
In your main code, show the form just before your problem loop.
while in your loop you can update some label or progress bar on the
form so that you have a visual indication of whether the loop is
doing something of value or if it is now simply spinning its wheels.
How you do this depends on what your loop is doing.
Also while in your loop check your boolCancel value. If true then
display any state information you want and break from the loop.
If your loop ends normally, hide/unload the progress dialog.
While working with Excel, I have many times faced the problem with Screen Refreshing.
Most of the time, in order to speed up VBA, programmers will use Application.ScreenUpdating = False. This will temporarily (until cancelled) stop screen refreshing. Unfortunately, there are cases, such as implementing progress bar, when you actually want to show some progress to the user. The problem is that the already mentioned command has stopped all screen refreshing.
This means, that even if on your UserForm you call a command to change a label (e.g. which would state Processing transaction 15 of 250) but you simply cannot get it to display.
What some people do in this case, is to temporarily enable ScreenUpdating, and right away disable it. This procedure is unfortunately unreliable, as if you have some difficult procedure (inserting complex formulas into cells) you are not guaranteed all the time that it will also refresh the label itself. Also the problem with this approach is, that you repaint not only your desired UserForm, but also Worksheet as well, and therefore this 'refresh' slows down your code quite a bit.
How can you refresh UserForm without refreshing the whole Excel?
The answer is simple.
Let's say that your userform is named frm_Main, so then in your VBA code you can simply call frm_Main.Repaint.
Simple as that!
I am working on a Word VBA macro app for 80 or so users. The office has high staff turnover, so training suffers, and so one of the self imposed requirements for this project is comprehensive, friendly documentation. However, to supplement this, and to save newbies having to open up a 100 page document when they want to try something new, I want a status bar on every userform (there are five) that provides contextual help. I find tooltips annoying.
I don't have a lot of experience, so I was wanting to
Essentially, I have a file containing every status string. (This is currently a text file, but I was wondering if I should use a spreadsheet or csv for ease of editing by other staff in future.) Every control has a MouseMove event which refers to a function: getStatus(cID) that opens the file, grabs the line and displays it in the status label. It also grabs a few parameters from the same line in the file, such as whether the label is clickable (to link to a page in the help file), and what colour the label should be.
So a few questions really:
Will the application be slow if a userform is constantly referring to a file? It feels fine to me, but I've been in it far too long, and I'm the only user accessing that file. There will be 80 constantly accessing it.
Is MouseMove over a control the best way? Should I instead use co-ordinates?
Most importantly (in terms of me having to do as little work as possible) is there some way to do this so that I do not have to have a MouseMove event on every single control? I have a good few hundred or so controls, each with their own identifier (well, not yet, but they will if this is the only way to do it). Maybe when the form loads I could load ALL the possible status lines so they're ready for whenever the control is moused over. But then, maybe the loading time is negligible?
Appreciate any ideas or thoughts - especially if VBA already has a whole range of functions to do this already and I'm just trying to reinvent the wheel. I can't use the application status bar, because the user rarely sees the application itself.
Thanks!
EDIT:
It is for both data entry, clicking around and a bit of document generation.
It is a controlled environment so macro security issues aren't a big concern for me - and if something goes wrong it's someone else's fault or problem :)
Is this data entry app or do they just click stuff? Because often the field with focus is different to the item the mouse is hovering over, this can cause a lot of confusion.
Constantly reading from a file is a huge waste of time and resources - it is much better to load them only once into an array or collection when the form is loaded.
On MouseMouse event is better than coordinates because you can move things around without worrying. It's a lot of code but you should be able to generate most of that if you have a list of control names because the code should be identical.
ie
Sub Control_MouseMove()
DisplayStatus(Control)
End sub
I would consider the StatusText property and ControlTipText property of controls for this kind of help.
StatusText
This example sets the status bar help text for the form field named "Age."
With ActiveDocument.FormFields("Age")
.OwnStatus = True
.StatusText = "Type your current age."
End With
ControlTipText
This can be assigned from the property sheet for the control.
Private Sub UserForm_Initialize()
MultiPage1.Page1.ControlTipText = "Here in page 1"
MultiPage1.Page2.ControlTipText = "Now in page 2"
CommandButton1.ControlTipText = "And now here's"
CommandButton2.ControlTipText = "a tip from"
CommandButton3.ControlTipText = "your controls!"
End Sub