Professional Excel Development: The Definitive Guide To Developing Applications Using Microsoft Excel And VBA

Professional Excel Development: The Definitive Guide to Developing Applications Using Microsoft Excel and VBA

Microsoft Excel can be much more than just a spreadsheet. It has become adevelopment platform in it own right. Applications written using Excel are partof many corporations' core suites of business-critical applications. In spite ofthis, Excel is too often thought of as a hobbyist's platform. While there arenumerous titles on Excel and VBA, until now there have been none thatprovide an overall explanation of how to develop professional-quality Excel-basedapplications. All three authors are professional Excel developers who runtheir own companies developing Excel-based apps for clients ranging fromindividuals to the largest multinational corporations. In this book they showhow anyone from power users to professional developers can increase thespeed and usefulness of their Excel-based apps.From the Back CoverFinally, there's a book that treats Excel as the powerful development platform it really is, and covers every facet of developing commercial-quality Excel applications.This is not a book for beginners. Writing for professional developers and true Excel experts, the authors share insider's knowledge they've acquired building Excel applications for many of the world's largest companies-including Microsoft. Professional Excel Development demonstrates how to get the utmost from Excel, addressing everything from application architectures through worksheet and userform design, charting, debugging, error handling and optimizing performance. Along the way, the authors offer best practices for every type of Excel development, from building add-ins through interacting with XML Web services. Coverage includesBuilding add-ins to provide new Excel functionsDesigning effective worksheets, userforms and other user interface elementsLeveraging Excel's powerful data analysis featuresCreating sophisticated custom chartsHandling errors, debugging applications and optimizing performanceUsing class modules and interfaces to create custom objectsUnderstanding Windows API calls: when to use them, and how to modify themAdding worksheet functions withC-based XLLsProgramming with databasesControlling external applications from ExcelIntegrating with Visual Basic 6, VB.NET and Visual Studio Tools for OfficeUsing XML to import and export data and communicate with Web servicesProviding help, securing, packaging and distributingThe accompanying CD-ROM contains the book's sample timesheet application at every stage of construction, with detailed code comments. It also includes many examples of the concepts introduced in each chapter and a collection of the authors' Excel development utilities.