XL97: Toolbox Disappears After Clicking TabStrip Control Tab

• Microsoft Excel 97 for Windows

SYMPTOMS

When you add a TabStrip control to a UserForm, then click a tab on the TabStrip, the Toolbox disappears.

CAUSE

A Tabstrip is not a separate form, but is a control on a UserForm that contains Tab objects. Since the border of the TabStrip defines a region of the form that you can associate with the tabs, when you place a control in the client region of the TabStrip, you are simply adding another control to the form that contains the TabStrip. Therefore, since a Tab cannot contain a control, the Toolbox is not displayed when a Tab is selected.

RESOLUTION

If you want the toolbox to reappear, click the UserForm that contains the TabStrip. This places the focus on the UserForm, and the toolbox is available for adding more controls to the UserForm.

STATUS

This behavior is by-design of TabStrips in Microsoft Excel 97.

MORE INFORMATION

A UserForm TabStrip control is very similar to a MultiPage control. But, the two controls are used in different implementations of your UserForm.

A MultiPage is useful when you work with a large amount of information that can be sorted into several categories. For example, use a MultiPage to display information from an employment application, where one page might contain personal information such as name and address and another page might contain personal references.

A TabStrip is used to view different sets of related information for related controls. For example, the controls might represent information about a daily schedule for a group of individuals, with each set of information corresponding to a different individual in the group. You could then set the title of each tab to show one individual's name. Then, you can write code that, when you click a tab, updates the controls to show information about the person identified on the tab.

REFERENCES

For more information about TabStrip Controls do the following:

   1. Activate a TabStrip control on a UserForm.

   2. Press F1 to display Microsoft Forms Reference.