How to use Cells, Ranges & Other Objects in Excel VBA

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This article is part of our VBA Crash Course. Please read the rest of the articles in this series by clicking below links.

Using Cells, Ranges & Other Objects in VBA Macros

  1. What is VBA & Writing your First VBA Macro in Excel
  2. Understanding Variables, Conditions & Loops in VBA
  3. Using Cells, Ranges & Other Objects in your Macros
  4. Putting it all together – Your First VBA Application using Excel
  5. My Top 10 Tips for Mastering VBA & Excel Macros

In part 3 of our VBA Crash Course, we are going to learn how to speak with various Excel objects like Cells, Ranges etc. and deal with them.

Objects – what are they?

Any thing and everything is an object. Your dog, your bed, your neighbors cat, their car, your bike, your computer, the shiny new Excel workbook you just created, my website, your email account – every thing is an object. For that matter, Lady Gaga’s meat dress is an object too. But that is a whole different subject.

From our “We are nuts” example yesterday, you can already see these objects:

  • One awesome owner (that is you)
  • 24 store manager objects
  • 24 store objects

Some sample objects you can find in Excel workbooks

  • Cells, lots of them
  • Ranges of cells
  • Worksheets
  • Charts
  • Pivot Tables
  • The entire workbook

Objects & Excel VBA

Since your Excel workbook is nothing but a collection of objects, whenever you want to make any change (like modify a cell’s value or recolor a chart), you need to refer to the corresponding object and do the necessary thing.

But how do we talk to these objects from VBA. Well, to know that, you must understand how an Object looks to our eyes vis-a-vis computer’s eyes. Here is an illustration to help you understand the difference.

Understanding Excel Objects and using them - How we perceive an object & how computer perceives it.

As you can guess, Objects have Properties. In the case above, color RED is a property of the cell object.

Objects – What are they made of?

In VBA world, objects are made of 2 things – properties & methods.

The color of a cell is a property.

You use copy method to copy cell’s value to Excel’s clipboard.

In other words, properties are what an object has. Methods are operations you do on the object.

Note: Certain objects also have a special class of methods called as Events. An Event is a special type of method that runs only when a circumstance is met. For example, select a cell, Excel internally runs SelectionChange Event on the current worksheet.

How do we access these properties & methods?

In plain English, if you want to know the color of a cell, you would ask “What is the color of cell A4?”

In Excel VBA language, the same becomes Range(“A4”).Interior.Color

Notice how the dot (.) is used like of in our plain English version.

Dot (.) is your best friend when dealing with objects. Since many Excel objects have dozens of properties and methods associated with them, to help us understand and use right properties, VBE (Visual Basic Editor) shows all the properties and methods whenever you press . after typing an object, like this:

Object Properties & Methods are shown when you press . in VBE

Most commonly used Objects in VBA:

While there are no single set of objects that are used by everyone for every need, there are a few VBA objects that are used in many situations. In this section, we will examine these objects.

Range Object:

Range object is used to refer to a range of cells. For example Range(“A1:A10”) refers to the cells A1:A10 in the current worksheet. Range has a lot of useful methods and properties. One of the commonly used property is is Range(“A1:A10”).cells which refers to all the cells in the range.

Tips on using range object:

  • You can use named ranges in Range object like this: Range(“myStoreList”)
  • You can use square brackets [] to refer to ranges like this: [A10] refers to Range(“A10”)
  • You can use variables in Range Object like this: Range(mylist) refers to whatever address is stored in mylist variable.
  • You can use variables along with static text, like this: Range(“A1:A” & endPoint) refers to the range A1:A120, assuming endPoint variable is 120.

ActiveCell Object:

Active cell object refers to the currently selected cell. If you have selected a range of cells, usually ActiveCell refers to the top-left cell.

Tips on using ActiveCell Object:

  • Use ActiveCell.End(xlDown).Activate to select the last cell in the same row with a value (assumes you have no breaks in between). You can also use options like xlToLeft, xlToRight, xlUp too.

Selection Object:

Selection object refers to the currently selected cells or anything else that is selected (like a chart or drawing shape).

How to learn about various Excel Objects and use them:

Excel has a lot of objects. Some times objects contain other objects. For example a Range contains some Cells. A Selection may contain some Charts. Understanding the hierarchy and properties of all these objects is a tough task. But thankfully, there is help.

Here are my top tips to learn about various Excel Objects:

  • Use Macro Recorder: Whenever you need to use an object that you are not familiar with, just use built-in macro recorder and do some operations on that object. Now stop it and view the code. You would have a good idea how to deal with that object. For ex. if you want to learn how to use VBA to refresh a pivot table, just start recorder, select the pivot, refresh it and stop the recorder. Now go and see the code and you will have a good idea how to refresh pivot tables from VBA.
  • Use VBA Help: Excel VBA has a very good help system. Just go to Visual Basic Editor (ALT+F11) and press F1 to start the help. Type the object name you want help on and read thru the pages to learn. VBE also has a helpful screen called “Object Browser” to visually browse various Excel objects and understand the methods & properties.
  • Learn from Code Examples: There are several sites, including Chandoo.org that publish frequent articles, code samples and tips on Excel & VBA. Follow a handful of these sites and learn from the shared examples.
  • Take up some project: In your day to day work, you always see some problems that can be solved with VBA. So go ahead and take up one such task and try to do it using VBA. This is a great way to learn a new language like VBA.
  • Join a Training Program: Last but not least, joining a training program is a good way to learn VBA. If you want a good program on VBA, consider joining our upcoming batch of VBA Classes.

Putting it all together – a Daily Sales Tracker for “We Are Nuts”:

So far you have learned What is Excel VBA, How to use variables, conditions & loops and How to use various Excel Objects.

In the next part, learn how to create a VBA Application combining all the things you learned so far.

What are your tips for learning about Excel Objects & Using Them?

Excel Object Model is vast and deep. There are a lot of things that we can learn (and remember), but there are a lot more that we will never know or memorize until we need to use them. I always rely on built-in macro recorder to learn about the objects and then modify the code until it works just right.

What about you? How do you learn about Excel Objects? Please share your tips & ideas using comments.

Join Our VBA Classes

We run an online VBA (Macros) Class to make you awesome. This class offers 20+ hours of video content on all aspects of VBA – right from basics to advanced stuff. You can watch the lessons anytime and learn at your own pace. Each lesson offers a download workbook with sample code. If you are interested to learn VBA and become a master in it, please consider joining this course.

Click here to learn more and Join our VBA program.

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14 Responses to “How many ‘Friday the 13th’s are in this year? [Formula fun + challenge]”

  1. in C3=2016
    in C4=3
    in C5=1 (the first next year with three Friday the 13ths)

    =SMALL(IF(MMULT(--(MOD(DATE(C3+ROW(1:1000),COLUMN(A:L),13),7)=6),ROW(1:12)^0)=C4,C3+ROW(1:1000)),C5)

    formula check in the next 1000 years

  2. Brian says:

    This will generate a table of counts of Friday the 13th's by year. If I didn't screw it up the next year with three is 2026.

    I created a simple parameter table with a start date and end date that I wanted to evaluate. That calculates the number of days and generates a list of those days. Then filter and group. The generation of the list in power query (i.e. without populating a date table in excel) is pretty cool, otherwise this isn't really doing anything than creating a big date and filtering/counting.

    let
    Source = List.Dates(StartDateAsDate, Days2, #duration(1,0,0,0)),
    ConvertDateListToTable = Table.FromList(Source, Splitter.SplitByNothing(), null, null, ExtraValues.Error),
    AddDayOfMonthColumn = Table.AddColumn(ConvertDateListToTable, "DayOfMonth", each Date.Day([Column1])),
    AddYearColumn = Table.AddColumn(AddDayOfMonthColumn, "Year", each Date.Year([Column1])),
    AddDayOfWeekColumn = Table.AddColumn(AddYearColumn, "Day of Week", each Date.DayOfWeek([Column1])),
    FilterFriday13 = Table.SelectRows(AddDayOfWeekColumn, each ([DayOfMonth] = 13) and ([Day of Week] = 5)),
    Friday13thsByYear = Table.Group(FilterFriday13, {"Year"}, {{"Number of Friday the 13ths!", each Table.RowCount(_), type number}})
    in
    Friday13thsByYear

    • Brian says:

      With the parameters replaced by values should you want to play along at home. This runs for 20 years starting on 1/1/2016.

      let
      Source = List.Dates(#date(2016,1,1), 7300, #duration(1,0,0,0)),
      ConvertDateListToTable = Table.FromList(Source, Splitter.SplitByNothing(), null, null, ExtraValues.Error),
      AddDayOfMonthColumn = Table.AddColumn(ConvertDateListToTable, "DayOfMonth", each Date.Day([Column1])),
      AddYearColumn = Table.AddColumn(AddDayOfMonthColumn, "Year", each Date.Year([Column1])),
      AddDayOfWeekColumn = Table.AddColumn(AddYearColumn, "Day of Week", each Date.DayOfWeek([Column1])),
      FilterFriday13 = Table.SelectRows(AddDayOfWeekColumn, each ([DayOfMonth] = 13) and ([Day of Week] = 5)),
      Friday13thsByYear = Table.Group(FilterFriday13, {"Year"}, {{"Number of Friday the 13ths!", each Table.RowCount(_), type number}})
      in
      Friday13thsByYear

  3. Alex Groberman says:

    =MATCH(3,MMULT(N(WEEKDAY(DATE(C3+ROW(1:100)-1,COLUMN(A:L),13))=6),1^ROW(1:12)),)+C3-1

    • David N says:

      It should be pointed out that Alex's solution, unlike some others, has the additional advantage of being non-array. My solution was nearly identical but with -- and SIGN instead of N and 1^.

      =C3-1+MATCH(3,MMULT(--(WEEKDAY(DATE(C3-1+ROW(1:25),COLUMN(A:L),13))=6),SIGN(ROW(1:12))),0)

  4. SunnyKow says:

    Sub Friday13()

    Dim StartDate As Date
    Dim EndDate As Date
    Dim x As Long
    Dim r As Long

    Range("C7:C12").ClearContents
    StartDate = CDate("01/01/" & Range("C3"))
    EndDate = CDate("31/12/" & Range("C3"))
    r = 7
    For x = StartDate To EndDate
    If Day(x) = 13 And Weekday(x, vbMonday) = 5 Then
    Cells(r, 3) = Month(x)
    r = r + 1
    End If
    Next
    End Sub

    • SunnyKow says:

      Calculate next year with 3 Friday 13th. Good for 100 years different from year entered in cell C3

      Sub ThreeFriday13()

      Dim StartDate As Date
      Dim EndDate As Date
      Dim x As Long
      Dim WhatYear As Integer
      Dim Counter As Integer

      Range("E7").ClearContents
      StartDate = CDate("01/01/" & Range("C3") + 1)
      EndDate = CDate("31/12/" & Range("C3") + 100)
      Counter = 0

      For x = StartDate To EndDate
      If WhatYear Year(x) Then
      WhatYear = Year(x)
      'Different year so reset counter
      Counter = 0
      End If
      If Day(x) = 13 And Weekday(x, vbMonday) = 5 Then
      Counter = Counter + 1
      If Counter = 3 Then
      WhatYear = Year(x)
      Exit For
      End If
      End If
      Next
      Range("E7") = WhatYear

      End Sub

      • SunnyKow says:

        *RE-POST as not equal did not show earliuer
        Calculate next year with 3 Friday 13th. Good for 100 years different from year entered in cell C3

        Sub ThreeFriday13()

        Dim StartDate As Date
        Dim EndDate As Date
        Dim x As Long
        Dim WhatYear As Integer
        Dim Counter As Integer

        Range("E7").ClearContents
        StartDate = CDate("01/01/" & Range("C3") + 1)
        EndDate = CDate("31/12/" & Range("C3") + 100)
        Counter = 0

        For x = StartDate To EndDate
        If WhatYear NE Year(x) Then
        WhatYear = Year(x)
        'Different year so reset counter
        Counter = 0
        End If
        If Day(x) = 13 And Weekday(x, vbMonday) = 5 Then
        Counter = Counter + 1
        If Counter = 3 Then
        WhatYear = Year(x)
        Exit For
        End If
        End If
        Next
        Range("E7") = WhatYear

        End Sub

  5. Devesh says:

    I've a doubt with using array formula here.
    In sample workbook, I tried to replicate the formula again.
    =IFERROR(SMALL(IF(WEEKDAY(DATE($C$3,ROW($A$1:$A$12),13))=6,ROW($A$1:$A$12)),$B7),"")
    For this I selected C7 to C12, and typed the same formula and pressed ctrl+alt+Enter. But in all cells it is taking $B7 (and not $B7, $B8, $B9.... etc)
    and since it is array formula I can't edit individual cell.
    Please guide.
    Thanks

  6. Pablo says:

    Hi Chandoo,
    Cool stuff. You need to clarify that the answer of 5 represents the 1st month in the year that has a Friday the 13th, and not the number of Fridays the 13th in the year. Subtle, but important difference.
    Thanks,
    Pablo

  7. Micah Dail says:

    I like the MMULT() function far more, but here's how I would have tackled it. It uses an EDATE() base and MODE() over 100 years. I'm assuming that 100 years is enough time to catch the next year with 3 friday 13th's. Array entered, of course.

    {=MODE(IFERROR(YEAR(IF((WEEKDAY(EDATE(DATE(C3, 1, 13), ROW(INDIRECT("1:1200"))))=6), EDATE(DATE(C3, 1, 13), ROW(INDIRECT("1:1200"))), "")), ""))}

  8. Jason Morin says:

    Finding all the Friday the 13ths in a Year:

    =SUMPRODUCT((DAY(ROW(INDIRECT(DATE(C3,1,1)&":"&DATE(C3,12,31))))=13)*(TEXT(ROW(INDIRECT(DATE(C3,1,1)&":"&DATE(C3,12,31))),"ddd")="Fri"))

  9. jmdias says:

    {=sum(if(day.of.week(DATe($YEAR;{1;2;3;4;5;6;7;8;9;10;11;12};13);1)=6;1;0))}
    just list the years

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