automating a mundane task - vba

Question

I have a simple task that i need to automate.
I get a email in a very specific format from another application based on a trigger.
What i want is that out look "reads" the data in that email and compare two cells. if one cell is greater than the other, then i want the email forwarded to a specified address otherwise delete the email.
the folowing vba code was attempted, but gives a run time error. please guide
Sub GetLines()
Dim msg As Outlook.mailItem
Dim rows As Variant
Dim numberofColumns As Long
Dim numberofRows As Long
Dim headerValues As Variant
Dim headerRow() As String
Dim data() As String
Dim i As Long, j As Long
' get currently selected email
Set msg = ActiveExplorer.Selection.item(1)
' tokenize each line of the email
rows = Split(msg.Body, vbCrLf)
' calculate array size
numberofColumns = Len(rows(0)) - Len(Replace(rows(0), Chr(9), ""))
numberofRows = UBound(rows) + 1
' put header row into array
ReDim headerRow(1 To numberofColumns)
headerValues = Split(rows(0), Chr(9))
For i = 1 To numberofColumns
headerRow(i) = Trim$(headerValues(i - 1))
Next i
' calculate data array size
numberofRows = numberofRows - 1
' put data into array
ReDim data(1 To numberofRows, 1 To numberofColumns)
For i = 1 To numberofRows
For j = 1 To numberofColumns
data(i, j) = Trim$(Split(rows(i), Chr(9))(j - 1))
Next j
Next i
End Sub

Answer 1

Your code makes too many unnecessary assumptions about the data and will give errors most of the time. Firstly you need to use F8 to step through the code to isolate the error in a particular line.
I suggest you change
Dim data() As String
to
Dim data As Variant
data = Array()
I'm not an expert in how VBA manages memory but I know that I get a lot less grief when I make things variants.
You are most likely to have a problem here:
For i = 1 To numberofRows
For j = 1 To numberofColumns
data(i, j) = Trim$(Split(rows(i), Chr(9))(j - 1))
Next j
Next i
What if not every row is perfectly formed?
Instead, try this:
For i = 1 To numberofRows
For j = 1 To Ubound(Split(rows(i), Chr(9))) + 1
data(i, j) = Trim$(Split(rows(i), Chr(9))(j - 1))
Next j
Next i
This allows your code to "survive" a blank line or some other error in the data.