VB macros

[HowardBrazee]

What are the plans for supporting VB macros? I'd dearly love to not need Windows for most of my Excel spreadsheets.

[pluby]

NeoOffice does have some support for Excel VBA macros. However, the support is very limited and tends to only work properly for very very simple macros. There is also one other limitation: while you can edit VBA macros in NeoOffice's macro editor, you cannot save your macro changes and only the original macros will be saved when you save the file.

The reason for these limitations is that Excel VBA is essentially a proprietary programming language create by Microsoft while NeoOffice is based on OpenOffice.org which has its own indendepently developed macro language called Basic. So for NeoOffice to run Excel VBA macros, it basically has to translate Excel VBA macros to its own internal Basic macro language and then execute the translated Basic macros.

That may sound simple, but the languages how very little common syntax so many Excel VBA commands have no directly matching set of Basic commands. Essentially, translating Excel VBA to Basic is like translating Japanese to English with automatic translation software. You may understand most of the translated wordings, but it will be very hard to read and some of the translation may make no sense.

So what can you do? The bad news is that the real problem here is that your spreadsheets are dependent on Excel VBA and since Excel VBA only works properly in Excel for Windows, the options available to you are limited to the following. Unfortunately, none of these options are easy or cheap. The first requires money but limited time whereas the second and third options require lots of time:

1. Excel for Mac - If NeoOffice cannot easily translate your Excel VBA macros and proper operation of those macros is very important for you, the safest bet is to buy a copy of Office 2004 for Mac. Buying the "2004" edition is critical because Microsoft removed VBA support in Office 2008.

2. Run Windows on your Mac - If you already have Windows and Office for Windows licenses and you have an Intel Mac (that is, any Mac machine built in the last few years), you can run Windows in a window on your Mac using free software such as VirtualBox.

3. Reimplement your macros in Basic - You can save your spreadsheet as a native Calc .ods file and then slowly work through each of your macros and reimplement them in Basic. The big disadvantage here is that Calc .ods files are not readable by Excel but Windows users can read your .ods files using OpenOffice.org.

Hope that helps.

Patrick

[ovvldc]

4. Run Office for Windows on your Mac using Wine or Crossover. The big advantage here is that you can run Windows Software without Windos, though not everything works seamlessly.

5. Wait until Office 2011 comes out, which will reportedly reinstate support for VBA on Office for Mac..

Just for completeness' sake .

Best wishes,
Oscar

[yoxi]

6. write (an (entire (OS and (office (package (using (lisp)))))))

Disclaimer: ((this is a) joke)

[pluby]

[HowardBrazee]

I have Parallels and Crossover, but the only thing I run on Crossover is Forte Agent. My home version of Office doesn't run the Excel spreadsheets I need though. So I log onto work to use them. I'm retiring at the end of the year and will lose that option.

Since I need to share these spreadsheets with Windows users, it appears that my options limited to upgrading Office for Windows or upgrading Office of OSX (provided it works as promised).

Thanks for the input.

[ovvldc]

Well, as said, Office 2011, which will come out at the end of the year, should restore VBA support to macs.

So you could hold off and do that. But parallels or crossover is much cheaper if you already have them.

I am surprised that the home version doesn't run the sheets. Is that because you have 2003 at home and 2007 at work? Otherwise, I thought that Excel was pretty much the same regardless of the edition..

Best wishes,
Oscar

[HowardBrazee]

[pluby]