Yesterday, I talked about how you don’t have to know how to code in order to highly leverage VBA. All you need to know is how to Google, Cut, and Paste. As discussed then, I ‘volunteered’ KV under pain of exposure to empty the contents of his secret satchel onto the virtual table, so that we can rummage through it. So without further ado, please put your hands together and give a warm Chandoo welcome to secret agent KV.
[Secret transmission starts…]
Hello, this is my first guest post on Chandoo.org (or any Excel website for that matter), and I will try to keep it simple, but useful for our readers.
I have been using spreadsheets since 1990, and Excel since 1995 – which sort of makes me a veteran in this sphere of business applications 🙂
One of my favorite topics in Excel is – “How can I make my day-to-day tasks in Excel easier and faster ?”. In fact, this is a topic that I think about in everything to do with computers.
There are many ways one can do this in Excel, but among the more effective and scalable ones, is storing commonly used macros in your Personal Macro Workbook.
This post is about some of the stuff that I have put in my Personal Macro Workbook over the years. You can read more about how to set up a Personal Macro Workbook, in this excellent tutorial on Ron de Bruin’s website. Like nuclear war, It’s a one-time exercise. And you can easily port it to any other computers that you use – or even share it with your friends and allied spooks.
This is the first bunch of macros which I use most frequently. Hopefully I will get a chance to post some more if this post is found to be good enough 🙂
So here goes.
1: Find the value of ActiveCell within selection, or in the whole sheet
This is a very useful macro which helps to search for the value in the ActiveCell within the selected range or the whole worksheet (if only ActiveCell is selected).
Sub SearchOnActiveCellContents()
' Keyboard Shortcut: Ctrl+Shift+G
On Error GoTo NotFound
If Selection.Cells.Count > 1 Then
Selection.Cells.Find _
(What:=ActiveCell.Value, After:=ActiveCell, LookIn:=xlValues, _
LookAt:=xlPart, SearchOrder:=xlByRows, SearchDirection:=xlNext, _
MatchCase:=False, SearchFormat:=False).Activate
Else
Cells.Find _
(What:=ActiveCell.Value, After:=ActiveCell, LookIn:=xlValues, _
LookAt:=xlPart, SearchOrder:=xlByRows, SearchDirection:=xlNext, _
MatchCase:=False, SearchFormat:=False).Activate
End If
Exit Sub
NotFound:
MsgBox "No cells found with this cell's contents"
End Sub
As you will notice, the macro checks whether the selection is 1 cell or multiple cells, and accordingly executes the Cells.Find command.
2: Filter on value NOT equal to ActiveCell value
This is another handy macro, which filters the current column based on the value of the active cell, except that the filter is applied as “show records NOT equal to the value of the active cell”
The macro itself is a fairly simple one-line command :
Sub AutoFilterSelectionNOT()
' Keyboard Shortcut: Ctrl+Shift+K
Dim lField As Long
lField = ActiveCell.Column - ActiveCell.CurrentRegion.Column + 1
If TypeName(Selection) <> "Range" Then Exit Sub
Selection.AutoFilter Field:=lField, Criteria1:="<>" & ActiveCell.Value
End Sub
3. Show or Hide zeros in active sheet
This macro toggles the display of zero-value cells on the active sheet.
Sub Hide_Zeros()
' Keyboard Shortcut: Ctrl+Shift+Z
If TypeName(Selection) <> "Range" Then Exit Sub
ActiveWindow.DisplayZeros = Not ActiveWindow.DisplayZeros
End Sub
4: Show or Hide page-breaks in active sheet
This macro toggles the display of page-breaks on the active sheet.
Sub ShowHidePageBreaks()
' Keyboard Shortcut: Ctrl+Shift+J
If TypeName(Selection) <> "Range" Then Exit Sub
ActiveSheet.DisplayPageBreaks = Not
ActiveSheet.DisplayPageBreaks
End Sub
As the name suggests , this macro will show or hide the display of page breaks on the active sheet.
5: Display the 'GoTo special' xldialog
Quite often I find myself needing to use the GoTo Special command.
Of course, you can do it the way it was designed in Excel – press F5 to display the GoTo dialog box, and click on the Special… button. This takes one keystroke and a mouse-click; or 3 keystrokes (if you don’t use the mouse) 🙂
Or you can display the Goto > Special… dialog box (using a macro) with just 1 click of the mouse or 2 keystrokes (if you pin it on the QAT) !
Sub xlSelectSpecial()
On Error GoTo NotFound
If Selection.Cells.Count = 1 Then
MsgBox "Select more than 1 cell...", vbExclamation, "Select more cells..."
Exit Sub
End If
Application.Dialogs(xlDialogSelectSpecial).Show
Exit Sub
NotFound:
myMsgText = "No such cells found"
myTitle = "Not found"
myConfig = vbOKOnly + vbExclamation
myMessage = MsgBox(myMsgText, myConfig, myTitle)
End Sub
As you will notice, the macro has an error-checking line in case the type of ‘special cell’ you selected is not found. E.g. if you’re looking for blank cells in the selection, and all the cells in it are non-blank, the macro will display a message accordingly.
The macro also checks whether more than one cell is selected before executing the dialog. The reason for this is that if a single cell is selected, many of the options in the GoTo Special dialog box will execute on the entire ‘UsedRange’ of the spreadsheet, instead of the selected range.
If you wish, you can comment out the If … End If construct and test the macro to see what I mean.
6: Zoom-in / Zoom-out
These macros zoom in or zoom out on the worksheet, in increments of 5%.
Sub MyZoomIn()
' Keyboard Shortcut: Ctrl+E
Dim ZP As Integer
ZP = ActiveWindow.Zoom
If ZP >= 400 Then
ZP = 400
Else
ZP = ZP + 5
End If
ActiveWindow.Zoom = ZP
End Sub
Sub MyZoomOut()
' Keyboard Shortcut: Ctrl+Shift+E
Dim ZP As Integer
ZP = ActiveWindow.Zoom
If ZP <= 10 Then
ZP = 10
Else
ZP = ZP - 5
End If
ActiveWindow.Zoom = ZP
End Sub
As you will notice, will increase or decrease the zoom percentage by 5 points each time the macro is executed. The If… Then… Else… constructs are there to prevent an error if the current zoom percentage is already at the maximum or minimum level, when the macro is executed.
That’s all for this post from my side. I hope you will find it useful.
I welcome comments, suggestions for improvement & criticisms from readers on this topic, and the macros I have shared in this post.
[Secret transmission ended.]
Hey, thanks KV for sharing those shortcut-charged shortcuts. I look forward to torturing some more of that ill-gotten wisdom out of you. (While I don’t condone torture, I hate inefficient use of Excel even more. So while it’s going to hurt you more than me, it’s for the greater good.)
About the Author
KV is an undercover secret agent who spends his time rescuing the world from the crushing weight of evil, bloated spreadsheets.
His mild-mannered alter ego - Khushnood Viccaji - is a freelance professional and an expert in Management Information Systems and Business Applications with a focus on Data Management, Analytics, Transformation, Auditing, and Reporting.
Both these chaps have a flair for understanding and applying technology in business processes and an ability to present business information in many different ways. And one of them wears lycra.
28 Responses to “Pimp your comment boxes [because it is Friday]”
This borders on Excel soft-cell...er, soft-core...porn. My favorite kind.
Wow, that is pimp-TASTIC! I have a question, as a VBA n00b: additional comment boxes stay plain unless I "run" the macro. Is there a way to change all comments, going-forward?
hi Chandoo, well, I like the macro approach. For those who don't like it, there is another way: just add the "draw" toolbar to the shapes toolbar (via Custom etc), click on "edit comment", click on the auto-shape and then choose "draw" drop-down, --> modify auto-shape --> then you even can have a heart or a banner (I like the horizontal banner in in purple :-)) . in excel 2007, you have to add this custom menu that you choose via Excel Options --> Custom --> it is called "change/ modify auto-shape"!!!
best,
@Chandoo. Great Post 🙂
@Tim : the way the macro is coded, it must be run very time.
@Community: If someone has an idea to perform it when opening an existing excel, it should be nice.
@Community: if someone has some code to revamp the commentboxes on all sheets, please share it. 🙂
@Microsoft Excel-progammers: some pimpoptions for the commentboxes should be great.
Cheerio
Tom
For the auto run, please add the codes in workbook:
Private Sub Workbook_SheetActivate(ByVal Sh As Object)
Call Comments_Tom
End Sub
Wow, that was a lot of fun... Thanks Tom!
@Jeff... Now, 5000 people know about your favorite porn... 😛
@Tim ... you can write an event to handle the new comments. I wouldnt recommend it as it is really painful. another option is to use the macro suggested by Yukikomi. It will update comments everytime you activate the sheet.
@laguerriere: very cool 🙂
@Chandoo ... Thanks! This is good stuff. I combined your tip with a tip from Mark O'Brien, then assigned it to a button on Excel 2010's Quick Access Toolbar, to format comments AS I add them. I also like how Mark's code saves me the trouble of backspacing my name out of new comments:
Sub AppendToExistingComment()
'Source: Mark O'Brien at http://www.mrexcel.com/forum/showthread.php?t=57296
Dim oRange As Range
Dim oComment As Comment
Dim sText As String
'Use object variable to hold range.
Set oRange = ActiveCell
'Use object variable for comment
Set oComment = oRange.Comment
'text to be added to the comment box
sText = InputBox("Type text to be added:", "APPEND TO COMMENT TEXT")
If Len(sText) = 0 Then End
'If Active Cell has a comment then append new text to the end of the comment text
If Not oComment Is Nothing Then
sText = oComment.Text & vbNewLine & sText
oRange.Comment.Delete
End If
'Add a comment with the contents of sText
oRange.AddComment sText
DoEvents
Comments_Tom
End Sub
Thank you very much for the code, it seems to be working for the most part; I am having a problem however. Once the routine makes the corrections to the comment, the comment becomes invisible. By invisible, I mean that when I highlight my mouse over it, nothing appears. However, when I right click the cell and click 'edit comment' then the comment becomes visible and I enter edit mode. Upon clicking out of the comment, it simply vanishes again. I've tried to fix this problem by adding a .shape.visible = msoTrue but then every comment is always visible. o_O please advise...
Thank you,
Nick
@Nick- That is because the font color of the comment is white and when you select the color of selection is also white hence you can not see anything. Try to change the color code in the routine to something else. would work
Thanks for that! The code works perfectly!
[...] look at Format Excel Comment Boxes using VBA Macros | Chandoo.org - Learn Microsoft Excel Online [...]
@ Chandoo - code works great and the comments look super cool. But I have ran into a small issue. In the comments, I am inserting pictures. When I run the macro, for all comments which already have pictures; pictures are deleted. Pls help me retain the pics in comments.
[…] posted some code one of his readers submitted, it "pimps" your comment boxes from those boring black-text-on-yellow rectangles to something more professional and eye-pleasing. […]
love in it
Hi Tom,
This looks really excellent. I am however relatively new to macros / VBA codes so having copy pasted your code in the Developer mode of an Excel file, what are the next steps to use them? Can you please help? Just to recap, I opened a blank Excel workbook, clicked on Developer, copy pasted the comments code and saved the file to the desktop.
Now how do I go about using it to add comments to an existing file? My apologies for asking a question which may be basic to you great geniuses, but I am not there yet and aspire to get there.
Many thanks for helping me with next steps that I need to take so that I can now use the code.
Best Wishes
Deepak Dave, CMA, MBA, PMP
Senior Management Consultant
Dear Dave,
The best thing to do is to copy the macro in the personal.xls(x) file. The personal excel file will always be launched when you open excel so you can use it with every excelworkbook.
Read all about it on the page of Microsoft.
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Copy-your-macros-to-a-Personal-Macro-Workbook-aa439b90-f836-4381-97f0-6e4c3f5ee566
Once you have the macro in the personal, you can 'call' the macro by the keyboardcombination 'alt+f8' and klik on the macroname.
Hope this clarifies the 'how to'. Good luck with your first steps in the wonderfull world of macro's.
Tom
Hi Tom,
Many thanks. I will try that out. Learning is fun and learning this stuff is even more amazing.
Best Wishes
Deepak Dave
There is a line 'Dim LArea As Long' which does not appear to be used. Have I missed something?
Dear Gary,
Correct the 'Dim LArea As Long' is indeed not relevant and can be deleted.
Tom
Excellent hack!
For some reason when I opened my file after using LibreOffice Calc, all comment boxes had changed to some arrow shape.
So this macro helped me from manually changing more than 5000 comments in a worksheet, or having to install some Excel extension.
I used it with the following attributes to get back old style comments:
It helped me from manually changing more than 5000 comments in a worksheet, or having to install some Excel extension.
.Shape.AutoShapeType = msoShapeRectangle
.Shape.TextFrame.Characters.Font.Name = "Calibri"
.Shape.TextFrame.Characters.Font.Size = 10
.Shape.TextFrame.AutoMargins = True
.Shape.TextFrame.AutoSize = True
Thanks a lot!
This was helpful, thank you
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the articles is really great : D. Good job, cheers
Is there code to add to this that will format a particular part of the comment (i.e. make the last sentence in the comment bold and in italics)?
This is fantastic!
How would I add auto-sizing to it?
I tried adding this:
.Shape.AutoSize = True but it gives me an error and as a novice at VBA I can't figure it out.
.Shape.TextFrame.AutoSize = True
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How should the code be changed in order to tun once for all worksheets in a workbook?