Show hide list boxes using VBA

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Rama, one of our readers emailed this:

Hello Chandoo I am very new to vba. Help me with this

Q) I Have Many List boxes In That I need to Hide Few Of them Using Check box

Example:If I have List boxes Like A,A1,B,B1

If I Check On Check box A(Captioned As A) It Should show A,A1 List boxes. If I Unchecked it Should Hide A,A1 List boxes

In a similar manner if i checked Check box B .It Should show B,B1 List boxes. If I Unchecked it Should Hide B,B1 List boxes

Show Hide list boxes by using a check box

We can use check box and a bit of VBA to do this easily. First see this demo:

Show hide list boxes using Excel VBA - Demo

How to show or hide list boxes – Video

Although the concept behind this is very simple, explaining it in a post will make it very long. So I made a 10 minute video. Please watch it below:

[Watch this on our youtube page]

For more on this technique – see Customer Service Dashboard article.

To insert check boxes & list boxes see this tutorial.

Download example workbook

Click here to download the example workbook to understand this technique better. Examine the code in module 1 & 2 to know more.

How do you hide / show things using VBA?

Selectively hiding or showing is a great way to enhance your models, dashboards or reports. I use this technique very often. Most of my dashboards, products etc. contain interactive help that user can see or hide with a click. In background, I use few lines of VBA to do this magic.

What about you? Do you face similar situations? How do you handle them? Share your VBA tips & ideas using comments.

Are you new to VBA?

If so, you have hit a treasure chest. Start with our Excel VBA page and get the basics. Once you are ready to take a deep dive, go thru dozens of VBA / Macro Examples.

And when you want more, consider joining our VBA classes.

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13 Responses to “Data Validation using an Unsorted column with Duplicate Entries as a Source List”

  1. Vipul says:

    Pivot Table will involve manual intervention; hence I prefer to use the 'countif remove duplicate trick' along with 'text sorting formula trick; then using the offset with len to name the final range for validation.

  2. Rich says:

    if using the pivot table, set the sort to Ascending, so the list in the validation cell comes back alphabetically.

  3. Kieranz says:

    Hui: Brillant neat idea.
    Vipul: I am intrigued by what you are saying. Please is it possible to show us how it can be done, because as u said Hui's method requires user intervention.
    Thks to PHD and all
    K

  4. sam says:

    Table names dont work directly inside Data validation.
    You will have to define a name and point it to the table name and then use the name inside validation
    Eg MyClient : Refers to :=Table1[Client]
    And then in the list validation say = MyClient

  5. Vipul says:

    Kieranz,
    Pls download the sample here http://cid-e98339d969073094.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/data-validation-unsorted-list-example.xls
    Off course there are many other ways of doing the same and integrating the formulae in multiple columns into one.

  6. Vipul says:

    Pls refer to column FGHI in that file. Cell G4 is where my validation is.

  7. Kieranz says:

    Vipul:
    Many thks, will study it latter.
    Rgds
    K

  8. [...] to chandoo for the idea of getting unique list using Pivot tables.  What we do is that create a pivot table [...]

  9. Playercharlie says:

    @Vipul:

    Thanks, that was awesome! 🙂

  10. Vipul says:

    @Playercharlie Happy to hear that 🙂

  11. Enrique says:

    Great contribution, Hui. Solved a problem of many years!

  12. FARIS says:

    Thanks to you, A LOT

  13. Mohamed says:

    Hi Hui,
    Greeting
    hope you are doing well.
    I'm interested to send you a private vba excel file which i need to show detail of pivot in new workbook instead of showing in same workbook as new sheet.

    Please contact me on muhammed.ye@gmail.com

    Best Regards

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