Openform action was canceled in MS-Access VBA code - vba

I am supporting an application which was running for the past 3 years. It was developed completely in MS Access and written in VBA.
Suddenly the application is facing the mentioned error at the following lines:
DoCmd.OpenForm FormName:="frmNewPeerGroup", View:=acNormal, windowmode:=acWindowNormal, OpenArgs:=5
FrmNewPeerGroup code
Private Sub Form_Open(Cancel As Integer)
Dim lDept As Long, lDiv As Long
lType = OpenArgs 'Supplied by caller
lAssmtVer = 1 'Current
sName = ""
sDescription = ""
dtCreatedDate = Format(Now(), "dd/mm/yyyy")
sCreatedBy = UCase(userPerms.NTLoginName)
lSupervisorID = userPerms.userID
lTeam = 0
With cmbBxType
.RowSourceType = "Value List"
.RowSource = GetValueListDict(pgType)
.Value = lType
.Enabled = (OpenArgs = 1)
End With
With cmbBxVersion
.RowSourceType = "Value List"
.RowSource = GetValueListDict(pgAssmtType)
.Value = lAssmtVer
End With
mgLogoDesc.Visible = False
txtBxCreatedDate.Value = dtCreatedDate
txtBxCreatedBy.Value = sCreatedBy
If OpenArgs = 5 Then
lTeam = oActiveAssmt.TeamID
lDept = GetParentID(aTeams(), CInt(lTeam))
lDiv = GetParentID(aDepts(), CInt(lDept))
With cmbBxDivision
.RowSourceType = "Value List"
.RowSource = GetValueListArray(aDivs())
.Value = lDiv
.Enabled = False
End With
With cmbBxDepartment
.RowSourceType = "Value List"
.RowSource = GetValueListArray(aDepts())
.Value = lDept
.Enabled = False
End With
With cmbBxTeam
.RowSourceType = "Value List"
.RowSource = GetValueListArray(aTeams())
.Value = lTeam
.Enabled = False
End With
Else
With cmbBxDivision
.RowSourceType = "Value List"
.RowSource = GetValueListArray(aDivs())
.Enabled = False
End With
cmbBxDepartment.Enabled = False
cmbBxTeam.Enabled = False
End If
End Sub
Many instances of the DoCmd.OpenForm command are giving the error in a message box saying:
The expression On Click you entered as the event property setting
produced the following error: The OpenForm action was canceled.
- The expression may not result in the name of macro, the name of
a user-defined function, or [Event procedure].
- There may have been an error evaluating the function, event, or macro.
This is the error message I am receiving.
My problem is, the same code was running around 3 years, but suddenly some updates to Microsoft or Office might be giving trouble to this code.
Did anyone come across this error in the past weeks? Please let me know what else we can do to make this work again.

This thread is very old but I came across the same error and spent a few hours looking for an answer. I was able to find the cause after some time and thought of posting my answer as it may help someone in a similar situation. Creating a application using Access Forms is new to me, so the error message was not directly intuitive.
My forms were Master table data entry forms and configured to be Pop-up and Modal with Me.Form.Name sent as parameter in the DoCmd.OpenForm command using a button (OnClick event) placed next to the Combo controls on a transaction form to allow user to quickly add new records. This parameter value was picked up in the Form_Open(Cancel As Integer) event and used later to refresh the combo box (Forms!<formname>.Controls!<controlname>.Requery) once data was submitted to the master table using the pop-up form.
It appears that the Open event doesn't occur when you activate a form that's already open (ref: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/aa211439(v=office.11).aspx). Each time I received the error, my data entry form was open in Design view in Access. So I closed the form in design mode, and repeated the steps. And Voila! no error!
Since I will have more than one forms open, I now need to test and try to use Form_Activate() as recommended in the above MSDN reference link.

I don't know if this qualifies as an answer, but the code in that OnOpen event is dependent on a lot of outside functions. Specifically, the code is assigning value lists for the RowSources of a bunch of combo boxes. The immediate red flag that occurs to me is that non-SQL Rowsources have a finite length, and in Access 97, that limit was 2048 characters (in Access 2003, it's 32,750 -- don't ask me why it's that number!).
So, the immediate thing I see is that perhaps what ever data drives the functions that create those value lists has begun to exceed 2048 characters in length.
If that's the actual answer, then you can write a callback function that will return the values in the arrays, and it won't have the limitation on the returned length. You'd set the RowsourceType to the name of your callback function and leave the Rowsource property blank.
An example of the callback function is found in the A97 help (though I can't find the same example in the A2K3 help). In A97 help, you get there by searching for RowsourceType, and then in the help window, click on the link in the sentence reading "You can also set the RowSourceType property with a ____user-defined function____."
To check this out, you just need to find out the length of the string returned from GetValueListArray() by each of the arrays referenced in the OnOpen event.
It also might be helpful to add an error handler to the OnOpen event, particularly given that there are so many outside dependencies in the code in that particular sub.
And last of all, let me say that it looks like horrible programming. Most of this ought to be settable with default properties, seems to me. I also question that kind of dependency on OpenArgs with such an undocumented input value. What does "5" mean? And what does "1" mean? Is that documented somewhere? It's just terrible, terrible code, in my opinion.
I'd likely do this with a standalone class module instead, because that will be self-documenting in terms of what does what. You'd set a particular named property to 5 and that would control what the form gets from the class module methods for populating the combo boxes. It would all be in one place, and you could use a meaningful property name to make it clear what the values 5 and 1 represent. It's particularly helpful to do this if you have the same kind of code in the OnOpen event of multiple forms. In that case, it's a no-brainer to move it out of the form modules, and the only question is whether you put it in a regular module or in a standalone class module (as I'm suggesting).
Anyway, perhaps none of this is on point, but it might give you some ideas.

Could it be the security settings is Access? All recent versions of Access has a security settings dialog where you can enable (or disable) macros in the application. I think you will get this error if macros are disabled.

Are you sure one of the required references (VBA IDE > Option > References) isn't missing?
If you're referencing Excel/Word or external objects, are you sure that the references to the type libraries are the right ones (if you're using specific versions instead of doing late binding)
Are you building the MDE on a 64 bit machine by any chance?

What is the code on the form frmNewPeerGroup? What version of Access are you using? If it is 2003, sp3 causes problems for which there is a hotfix. Have you tried decompile and / or compact and repair?
If you have an original mdb, check the references to make sure that none of them are marked MISSING. This is quite a likely reason for problem in that it has suddenly occurred.
To check the references, look at Tools->References on the menu for a code window.
If no references are missing, you could try stepping through the form code to get a more exact idea of where the error is occurring.

Related

Changing a CheckBox's Font Attribute "Strikethrough" from a specific module does not work

Using VBA (Excel 365 (16.0.12527.20880), German) I'm trying to set the strikethrough property of a checkbox (Checkbox1) caption to False in accordance to the Office VBA reference this should work.
The following code is placed in a Module1 (simplified) and changes the strikethrough-value of UserForm1.Checkbox1 (UserForm1 and Checkbox1 is static, created via the VBA-Editor, not via code during runtime).
Sub ChangeCheckBox()
UserForm1.CheckBox1.Caption = "Test" 'this triggers the Init-Procedure, which only sets the Height and Width of the UserForm. This shouldn't effect the problem, but I'm mentioning it here so it's clear that the form has been initialized. But if I leave it out, it's the same problem.
'Pre-Test - works fine
'Check initial value
Debug.Print UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough 'returns false (as it should)
'Write value and check it
UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough = False
Debug.Print UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough 'returns false (as it should)
'Write value and check it again
UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough = False
Debug.Print UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough 'returns false (as it should)
'This next line seeems to cause the post-test failure
tmpString = ThisWorkbook.Worksheets("Sheet1").Cells(tmpIndex, tmpColumn).Value
Debug.Print tmpString 'returns the correct value
'Post-Test - fails!!!
'Check initial value
Debug.Print UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough 'returns false (as it should)
'Write value and check it
UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough = False
Debug.Print UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough 'returns true (should still be false)
'Write value and check it again
UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough = False
Debug.Print UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough 'returns true (definitely should return false now)
End Sub
In my case, for some reason, the command sets the box to True instead of False. So far I pinpointed the problem to a specific line of code. The "Pre-Test" succeeds, the "Post-Test" fails (everything else works fine). Note, I'm using debug mode via step by step, no other code is executed "in-between".
The problem persists if I create a different Form and try the same thing there. The original procedures are several hundred lines of code, but I created the Testprocedure above and the problem persists. I can also reproduce it by creating a new Excel file from scratch with just one Sheet, one Userform/Checkbox, and one Module containing the test procedure.
So, why the hell does tmpString = ThisWorkbook.Worksheets("Sheetname").Cells(tmpIndex, tmpColumn).Value cause the "Post-Test" to fail?
Note: This error can not be reproduced on all machines, I tried it on a different machine. There, I can not reproduce the error.
I cannot reproduce the issue and I've tried on 3 different machines.
However, I remember seeing a similar issue about 7 years ago and I managed to work around it by first checking if I need to change the value of the font property.
Try replacing all occurences of this:
UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough = False
with this:
If UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough Then UserForm1.CheckBox1.Font.Strikethrough = False
This basically sets the .Font.Strikethrough property to False only if it is already True because otherwise it is False (obviously) and if there is any bug in the setter of that property then this skips the bug.
Unrelated to your question but it's not a good idea to use the default instance of a Userform like you're doing here with Userform1.Checkbox.... I recommend you read this article written by #MathieuGuindon back in 2017.
Try using index for your worksheet instead of the name.
Its a funny thing to happen in a programming language.
tmpString = ThisWorkbook.Worksheets(1).Cells(tmpIndex, tmpColumn).Value
Debug.Print tmpString
It worked for me and I think because the polymorphic functions in VBA made without debugging! because nothing else could cause this kind of behavior!
I've managed to reproduce the issue the same way it occured to you.
The root cause here is that you are not explicitly UNLOADING the form after you close it, which means that all modifications that you made to it while open get retained in memory.
For example using your code, shows the checkbox with strikethrough even when running it 2nd time. Which means it's retained in memory.
So to fix this, simply add Unload UserForm1 in your procedure after running the code.
While this approach works in resetting the checkbox (which I assume is your ultimate goal here), it still returns true for those last 2 checks for some reason. To workaround that as well (though it could be unnecessary if you achieve your goal), then simply use #Cristian Buse's if/then solution.

Input box getting a compile error in VBA

I am learning how to create input boxes and I keep getting the same error. I have tried two different computers and have received the same error. The error I get is a "Compile Error: Wrong number of arguments or invalid property assignment"
Here is my code:
Option Explicit
Sub InputBox()
Dim ss As Worksheet
Dim Link As String
Set ss = Worksheets("ss")
Link = InputBox("give me some input")
ss.Range("A1").Value = Link
With ss
If Link <> "" Then
MsgBox Link
End If
End With
End Sub
When I run the code, it highlights the word "inputbox"
And help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
G
Three things
1) Call your sub something other than the reserved word InputBox as this may confuse things. *Edit... and this alone will resolve your error. See quote from #Mat's Mug.
2) A̶p̶p̶l̶i̶c̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶.̶I̶n̶p̶u̶t̶B̶o̶x̶(̶"̶g̶i̶v̶e̶ ̶m̶e̶ ̶s̶o̶m̶e̶ ̶i̶n̶p̶u̶t̶"̶)̶ Use VBA.Interaction.InputBox("give me some input"). You can do this in addition to the first point. Documentation here.
3) Compare with vbNullString rather than "" . See here. Essentially, you will generally want to do this as vbNullString is, as described in that link, faster to assign and process and it takes less memory.
Sub GetInput()
Dim ss As Worksheet
Dim Link As String
Set ss = Worksheets("ss")
Link = VBA.Interaction.InputBox("give me some input")
ss.Range("A1").Value = Link
' With ss ''commented out as not sure how this was being used. It currently serves no purpose.
If Link <> vbNullString Then
MsgBox Link
End If
' End With
End Sub
EDIT: To quote #Mat's Mug:
[In the OP's code, what is actually being called is] VBA.Interaction.InputBox, but the call is shadowed by the procedure's identifier "InputBox", which is causing the error. Changing it to Application.InputBox "fixes" the problem, but doesn't invoke the same function at all. The solution is to either fully-qualify the call (i.e. VBA.Interaction.InputBox), or to rename the procedure (e.g. Sub DoSomething(), or both.
Sub InputBox()
That procedure is implicitly Public. Presumably being written in a standard module, that makes it globally scoped.
Link = InputBox("give me some input")
This means to invoke the VBA.Interaction.InputBox function, and would normally succeed. Except by naming your procedure InputBox, you've changed how VBA resolves this identifier: it no longer resolves to the global-scope VBA.Interaction.InputBox function; it resolves to your InputBox procedure, because VBAProject1.Module1.InputBox (assuming your VBA project and module name are respectively VBAProject1 and Module1) are always going to have priority over any other function defined in any other referenced type library - including the VBA standard library.
When VBA resolves member calls, it only looks at the identifier. If the parameters mismatch, it's not going to say "hmm ok then, not that one" and continue searching the global scope for more matches with a different signature - instead it blows up and says "I've found the procedure you're looking for, but I don't know what to do with these parameters".
If you change your signature to accept a String parameter, you get a recursive call:
Sub InputBox(ByVal msg As String)
That would compile and run... and soon blow up the call stack, because there's a hard limit on how deep the runtime call stack can go.
So one solution could be to properly qualify the InputBox call, so that the compiler knows exactly where to look for that member:
Link = VBA.Interaction.InputBox("give me some input")
Another solution could be to properly name your procedure so that its name starts with a verb, roughly describes what's going on, and doesn't collide with anything else in global scope:
Sub TestInputBox()
Another solution/work-around could be to use a similar function that happens to be available in the Excel object model, as QHarr suggested:
Link = Application.InputBox("give me some input")
This isn't the function you were calling before though, and that will only work in a VBA host that has an InputBox member on its Application class, whereas the VBA.Interaction.InputBox global function is defined in the VBA standard library and works in any VBA host.
A note about this:
If Link <> "" Then
This condition will be False, regardless of whether the user clicked OK or cancelled the dialog by "X-ing out". The InputBox function returns a null string pointer when it's cancelled, and an actual empty string when it's okayed with, well, an empty string input.
So if an empty string needs to be considered a valid input and you need to be able to tell it apart from a cancelled inputbox, you need to compare the string pointers:
If StrPtr(Link) <> 0 Then
This condition will only be False when the user explicitly cancelled, and will still evaluate to True if the user provided a legit empty string.

Programming VBA in an Outlook form

I created my own Outlook form to use it as standard surface to enter certain orders instead of the normal message form. The creation, editing and sending works perfectly fine and in the next step I want to insert some code via VBA.
My problem is that I can´t access the objects of my form in the VBA editor. E.g. I want to show a message box when a certain checkbox is checked. According code would be:
Sub example()
If CheckBox1.Value = True Then
MsgBox("Checkbox 1 is checked.")
End If
End Sub
When I run the code I get the error that the object could not be found. The same goes for every other object, like textboxes or labels etc.
I guess the solution is pretty simple, like putting Item. or sth. like that in front of each object. But so far I wasn't able to find the solution.
I´m using Outlook 2010.
I know this is a year too late but you'll want to do something like this example below. It's kinda a work around but you can get whatever value was selected.
Sub ComboBox1_Click()
Set objPage = Item.GetInspector.ModifiedFormPages("Message")
Set Control = objPage.Controls("ComboBox1")
MsgBox "The value in the " & Control.Name & _
"control has changed to " & Control.Value & "."
End Sub
You should be able to get the value, just get a handle on the object you want using the Inspector
The following is an excerpt from here
When you use a custom form, Outlook only supports the Click event for
controls. This is a natural choice for buttons but not optimal for
controls like the combo box. You write the code by inserting it into a
form’s VBScript editor. You need to have the Outlook form open in the
Form Designer and click the View Code button found in the Form group
of the Developer tab.
Sub CheckBox1_Click()
msgbox "Hello World"
End Sub
The code page is fairly minimal with no syntax highlighting. I just tried this now and it does work. Dont forget to Publish your form to pick up the new changes.
I know this is almost 6 years late but, in VB and VBA, simply start with the form name. (And if that doesn't work, just keep going up a parent object and you'll get there.) So, your code becomes:
Sub example()
If MYFORMNAME.CheckBox1.Value = True Then
MsgBox("Checkbox 1 is checked.")
End If
End Sub
Of course, after typing "MYFORMNAME." you'll know if it will work because typomatic will kick in when the system recognizes "MYFORMNAME" after you hit the period.

how to access dialog fields in visual basic word macros

I try to save a Word 2010 document to PDF and then want to do something with the file(name) that the user selected for this purpose in the corresponding dialog.
Also, I would like to make a few preconfigurations of dialog settings.
However, the following macro (in Microsoft Visual basic for Aplications 7.0, i.e. the stuff you get when simply recording and then modifying macros) does not work:
Sub MyMacro()
dim retval as long
dim DidTheExportToPdfActuallyTakePlaceSuccessfully as Boolean
dim WhatWasThePdfFilenameTheUserChoseFinally as String
With Dialogs(wdDialogExportAsFixedFormat)
.ExportFormat = wdExportFormatPDF
.OpenAfterExport = True
.OptimizeFor = wdExportOptimizeForPrint
.Range = wdExportAllDocument
.Item = wdExportDocumentContent
.IncludeDocProps = True
.KeepIRM = True
.CreateBookmarks = wdExportCreateNoBookmarks
.DocStructureTags = True
.BitmapMissingFonts = True
.UseISO19005_1 = False
retval = .Show()
' DidTheExportToPdfActuallyTakePlaceSuccessfully = ???
' WhatWasThePdfFilenameTheUserChoseFinally = ???
end with
end sub
First of all, I get errors in all the lines .ExportFormat etc.
It appears these problems are caused by late binding.
To circumvent this problem I tried to add option strict off on top, but that immediately produces a compilation error ("Base or Compare or Explicit or Private expected").
I also read about reflection, but it seems that things necessary for that according to online findings (such as dim x as System.Type or y.gettype()) don't compile either ...
If I simply remove the offending lines, the dialog shows successfully and the pdf export takes places successfully. However, it seems that retval is always 0, no matter if the file is actually exported or the user hit cancel. Not to mention that extracting the actual pdf filename fails in the same way as does pre-filling the dialog options.
I'm a bit at a loss because all googling and searching through MS online help tends to take me only to almost compatible situations (especially, nothing found compiles, see above). What is the right way to achieve my goal?
Broadly speaking, only the older builtin dialogs in Word support "late bound" named parameters. Since around Word 2000, most (if not all) of them only recognise the early bound members of the Dialog class.
Possible workarounds include
try to use Sendkeys (IMO always difficult to get right at the best of
times)
try to control the Dialog window via WIN32+Windows messages (no idea
on feasibility there)
adapt one of the standard Application FileDialogs as best you can (in
this case, probably Application.FileDialog(msoFileDialogSaveAs) ),
then follow up with your own UserDialog that prompts for any other
options that you need, then call ExportAsFixedFormat to do the work.
(+variations on (c), e.g. do some of it in .NET with a WIndows form)

VBA User form with ThemeColorScheme and late binding

I'd like to run a user form with status bar.
I show my form with code bolow.
How should I declare variables and assigning new values to those variables?
Very important: I have to use late binding in my project.
Sub RunMyUserForm()
With MyUserForm
.LabelProgress.Width = 0
.TextBox1 = 1
'to make the progress bar color match the workbook's current theme:
.LabelProgress.BackColor = ActiveWorkbook.Theme.ThemeColorScheme.Colors(msoThemeAccent1)
.Show vbModeless
End With
End Sub
Thank you in advance for your help!
Updated information:
When I try to run my macro with "Option Explicit", it doesn't work (Compile error: Variable not defined - part of code msoThemeAccent1 is marked as yellow color). That's why I asked for help in defining the variables.
When I try to run my macro without "Option Explicit", it dosen't work (Err.Description: "Value is out of range", Err.Number: -2147024809)
When I try to run my macro with early binding (reference to "MS Office Object Library" via Tools/References in VBE) everything works perfect with (and without) "Option Explicit".
Your compiler is seeing msoThemeAccent1 as a variable, and it is undeclared. This is why your code won't run with Option Explicit and also why your code raises an error when you disable Option Explicit. .Colors is a 1-based collection (?) so when you call:
ActiveWorkbook.Theme.ThemeColorScheme.Colors(msoThemeAccent1)
It is compiling to:
ActiveWorkbook.Theme.ThemeColorScheme.Colors(0)
Which raises an expected, albeit cryptic error.
I used some code to check the value of this constant, but in hindsight I should have just referred to the documentation:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel-help/HV080559557.aspx
This should fix it for you
ActiveWorkbook.Theme.ThemeColorScheme.Colors(5)
Alternatively, if you need to rely on this value in several places in your code, you could declare a variable (public or private, scope depends on what you need it for).
Public Const myAccentColor1 as Long = 5
And then, in your code you could:
ActiveWorkbook.Theme.ThemeColorScheme.Colors(myAccentColor1)
Revised
I understand now, without reference to MS Office Object Library this makes sense. This is one of the few libraries that I maintain a reference to in my XLSB file, so my confusion was a result of the fact that I thought I was using an appropriate late-binding, but I was really using early-binding.