Learn Access 2003 VBA with The Smart Method

106

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Lesson 5-9: Use the help

system and the object browser

The Visual Basic help system can provide all of the information you need

about both the Visual Basic programming language and the Access object

model. This session will teach you how to quickly find help on any topic.

Getting help using the Visual Basic help system

1

Open the code editor and click on the object name

Err

in the

error handler for the cmdAddTwoNumbers event handler.

2

Press the F1 key.

The Help system starts and displays information about the Error

object. Links are also provided to list the object’s properties and

methods.

Getting help using the Object Browser

The object browser provides a quick reference to all of the objects in the

Access object model. Each object’s Properties, Methods and Events are also

documented.

1

Open the VBA editor.

2

Open the object browser by either pressing the <F2> key, by

selecting View Object Browser from the menu, or by

clicking the Object Browser button

on the standard

toolbar.

3

Select

Access

from the drop down list in the top left corner of

the Object Browser.

4

Type

CommandButton

(no spaces) in the search box

beneath the drop down list.

5

Click the Search button

.

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Session Five: Professional Grade VBA

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107

The Search Results pane shows the objects found with the best

guesses at the top.

You can click on any of the objects in Search results (or select

directly in the Classes pane) to see all properties, methods and

events of the chosen object type.

6

Select the

Command Button

object in the top pane and

browse all of its Properties, Methods and Events.

Properties are marked with the

icon, Methods with the

icon and Events with the

icon.

7

Obtain detailed help on the Command Button’s

Click

event.

Scroll down the list of Properties, Methods and Events until you

find the Click event.

With the Click event selected click the yellow question mark icon

at the top of the dialog.

The help system displays detailed help for the Command Button’s

Click event.

note

The terminology Class and

Object refer to almost the same

thing.

A Class is the actual definition

of the object. Think of it as the

mould from which all new

objects are made.

One Class can be used to create

any number of Objects.