The first plug in I am to design in VSTO (not VBA is what that means) is to have the user mark up a document with bookmarks – a set of bookmarks that leads you along. The bookmarks are to be named in a very specific format. The tool will force the user to use the “select first” type bookmark. You can toggle the viewing of bookmarks as well.
How to Create Add-Ins Using VSTO in MS-Word – this gets one started.It is VS2010 and I am using VS 2013 – but it gives a really good view of adding a ribbon item, using forms and making it all work. Ok – I tried it – this is like trying to kill a mosquito with a elephant gun – but that is what corporate wants. Every time you click “run” it starts a new version of Word. This means that you have to load the document of interest every time. In VBA – you “run” from the context you are already in <- RIGHT THERE IS THE CRUX of my axe griding as well as VBA on the fly debugging on ANYONE”S MACHINE. Alas…
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Thanks for the link. I use Excel extensively at work & dabble in macros to make my work faster. I want to try and develop an Excel Add-In using VSTO. However so far I cannot find a simple tutorial on this… it seems none of the Microsoft learning resources have. If you have any references on I’d surely appreciate it.
Did you get anywhere with this? I have published many other articles since along with those that work with me – so do another search for VSTO and COM. I have to problems Teamviewing with you to set your first VSTO especially if you want to get it VBA compatible. There are SOOOOO MANY PITFALLS. First, I would NOT use VSTO unless you have to. I HAVE to – the IT group says it has to be done in c# and they have NEVER EVER done any Excel programming and will not be looking at any of my work – so I am doing what they want BUT (here is the trick…) I am making all my classes VBA exposed – which means I can use all my VSTO work as an Addin AND as a VBA library. So I am not being held accountable … yet I have to do it their way. The only advantages I have noticed are speed improvements, being able to use .net methods, a lot of hair loss and many more hours chargeable to the project (which is not good for the client and I have mentioned this several times to them – but alas). There is little I can’t do with straight VBA some way.
Oh – and another advantage of VSTO is no one can jigger or reverse engineer the code easily. Again – not great for the client and I too have explained that but for me – that is a good thing.