XL97: Styles("X").Parent Different in MS Excel 97

• Microsoft Excel 97 for Windows

SYMPTOMS

When you run a Visual Basic for Applications macro in Microsoft Excel 97, your macro may behave incorrectly if it accesses the Parent property of a Style object ("Styles.Parent").

CAUSE

This may occur because the Parent property of a Style object is different in Microsoft Excel 97 than it is in earlier versions of Microsoft Excel:

   Version(s)                 Parent Property of Style Object Returns
   ------------------------------------------------------------------
   Microsoft Excel 97         a Workbook object
   Microsoft Excel 5.0, 7.0   the Application object

WORKAROUND

If your macro contains code that accesses the Parent property of a Style object, and you expect the Parent property to return the Application object, you must remove "Parent" from your macro and replace it with "Application". If you do this, the macro will work correctly in Microsoft Excel versions 5.0, 7.0 and 97.

For example, assume your macro contains the following line of code:

   X = ActiveWorkbook.Styles(1).Parent.Name

   X = ActiveWorkbook.Styles(1).Application.Name

STATUS

This behavior is by design of Microsoft Excel 97. The behavior in earlier versions of Microsoft Excel is incorrect.

MORE INFORMATION

In Microsoft Excel, almost every type of object has a Parent property. The Parent property of an object returns the larger object that contains it. For example, ActiveCell.Parent returns the worksheet that contains the active cell.

In earlier versions of Microsoft Excel, the Parent property of a Style object is the Application object ("Microsoft Excel"). This is actually incorrect; the Parent property of a Style object should be the Workbook object that actually contains the style. This change is incorporated in Microsoft Excel 97.