Future of VBA (and VBScript)?

Future of VBA (and VBScript)?

• balupton

  It looks as if this is an atempt but does not look promissing to me as a heavy VBA user of Excel in an investment bank. But it might change in Office 2005 not sure.
  
  VSTO - - Visual Studio Tools for the Microsoft Office System
  But only for Word and Excel and Office 2003.
  
  More info here
  http://www.devx.com/OfficeProDev/Article/27435/0/page/1
  
  Regards
  Lars Schouw
  

• rmund11

  In Excel 2007, Microsoft has not yet phased out grudging support for XLM, a primitive macor programming language introduced in Excel 4, which came out in the early 1990s. VBA is still strongly supported, with modifications to the VBA object model being made for every release of Office, although there have been no enhancements to the IDE or to the language itself since Office 2000. It is not conceivable that VBA be replaced until there is a viable alternative. Things like .Net, VSTO, VSTA, XML have been discussed as replacements, and in fact Office 2007's user interface has been ripped out of VBA and converted to the XML-based ribbon. But the other alternatives do not offer the ease of development of small ad hoc solutions, nor readily deployed Office add-ins, and they take such development out of the hands of Office users, and place it into the realm of serious programmers, whose knowledge of the specific Office programs may be less extensive. As such, development of equivalent solutions in the newer technologies show increased development, deployment, and maintenance costs. I believe Microsoft has even issued statements that VBA will be around for X more versions and Y more years, though I don't really recall what X and Y are, I was not alarmed when I heard what they were. If Microsoft removed VBA, many companies would be even more reluctant to upgrade than they were to use 2007, because the costs of bringing millions of likes of VBA code into another development environment would be prohibitive.

  - Jon
  -------
  Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP
  Tutorials and Custom Solutions
  Peltier Technical Services, Inc. - http://PeltierTech.com
  _______

  
  
  

• vbdr

  I need to develop excel solutions which work for windows and os x.
  
  what script language / other possibility do you suggest
  
  seems that vba support for os x
  is discontinued from office 2008 on...
  
  So your X and Y seem not to far away
  
  thanks for any suggestions!
  
  
  simon
  
  

• DanJGarner

  This bit of info was posted on another thread by a member of the VSTO team:
  
  

  "VSTO 2005, which ships in the next month, will not have any support for Access. We're looking to support Access in VSTO v3, which is the next release after this one.
  
  If you have any specific requirements that you'd like us to address, please forward them so that we can add them to our planning for v3."
  
  -brenda (ISV Buddy Team)

  
  
  

• Satya vani

  Jon,

  I appreciate your comments. They are helpful and reassuring.

  Rog

  
  

• Corgalore

  I am unclear on what the migration or future is for applications that have been written in VBA in Access 2002 when we move to Office 12.
  
  What will happen with our existing applications
  
  Do we need two versions of Access
  
  Will they both run on the same computer
  
  Is there a migration for VBA code, or is this a rewrite
  
  Should we stop writing VBA code now in preparation for Office 12 which we will get next year
  
  Should we transition to something now that will be compatible when we get Office 12
  
  Thanks for the help.
  
  

• sk80

  Microsoft has announced plans to continue supporting VBA in Microsoft Office for many years to come and to continue supporting the hundreds of ISVs who have licensed VBA for their own products. I don't believe the members of this forum need to fear that their VBA code is in any jeopardy.
  
  At the same time, Microsoft continues to work on programmability technologies that are aimed at .NET applications, working closely with the VBA Partners to understand their requirements. At some point, I'm sure Microsoft will make their plans known for .NET programmability.
  
  Bill Fisher
  Summit Software Company
  

• CaptnJamesKirk

  Hi Simon,

  You might want to check out the Visual Studio Tools for Office as a possible alternative. Here's the link to the VSTO Developer Center:

  http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/office/aa905533.aspx

  -brenda (ISV Buddy Team)

  
  
  

• SmartDocParis

  Thanx! Nice to hear this.
  
  

• Brian Poploskie

  Hi!
  
  I read somewhere that VBA will be raplaced by VB.NET and the VBScript too (in ASP.NET).
  There will be new scripting host but I don't know if it will replace the cmd.exe or the WSH.
  Can anybody give us more info on this
  
  

• Nick S

  In general, VBA will continue to work as before. Applications written in earlier versions will continue to work in the new version.

  There will be problems for old VBA code that tries to control command bars and menus in applications that have the new ribbon interface. There will also be issues if the object model in the application has changed. I am not familiar with Access, although I have heard that new versions typically cause greater upheaval in terms of file formats and object model than the other Office applications.

  For my own business (I design custom Excel/VBA programs for independent clients), I have no intention to upgrade to Office 2007, at least not until a critical mass of my clientele has upgraded. This is not due to VBA issues, but more because of the mismatch between the Menu/Command Bar interface of Office 97-2003 and the Office 2007 Ribbon interface, and to the decreased customizations possible in the newer interface.

  - Jon
  -------
  Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP
  Tutorials and Custom Solutions
  http://PeltierTech.com
  _______

  
  
  

• Christopher J. Cooper

  VBA and vB Script will exist. VB.net and ASP might replace in the near future. However, there are some easy VBA coding that is absent (to my knowledge) in .Net
  
  For example, the selection.find.execute and other functions are not available. I also had tough time using the .FoundFiles option i am used to in VBA in other languages
  
  

• Clark Wilson

  I see there were two comments on this in 2006, and here we are in June, 2007. Around our office, some of the IT folks are saying that VBA is going to go away and be replaced by C#. Others have said that VBA can't possibly be phased out because hundreds of organizations have tens of thousands, perhaps millions of critical VBA applications in Word, Excel, Access and PowerPoint. It could be a disaster to lose this capability. And yet the debate goes on. What are the MVP's saying about this in 2007.

  Rog

  
  

• JamesZ

  I know VBA can't be replaced just of yet, but what about adding C# into Office consideration I think I can do C# for Office using Visual Studio, but I don't want to use more than one software. I like to open up my excel file and just edit the macros in C# language and a mini C# editor. When can we see such thing happening I know VBA has its charm, but C# is the future man. It will be lovely to start coding my program in C# for Excel.
  
• Future of VBA (and VBScript)?