MsgBox Function

Description

Displays a message in a dialog box, waits for the user to click a button, and returns an Integer indicating which button the user clicked.

Syntax

MsgBox(prompt[, buttons] [, title] [,, helpfile, context])

The MsgBox function syntax has these named arguments:

Part	Description

prompt	Required. String expression displayed as the message in the dialog box. The maximum length of prompt is approximately 1024 characters, depending on the width of the characters used. If prompt consists of more than one line, you can separate the lines using a carriage return character (Chr(13)), a linefeed character (Chr(10)), or carriage return – linefeed character combination (Chr(13) & Chr(10)) between each line.
buttons	Optional. Numeric expression that is the sum of values specifying the number and type of buttons to display, the icon style to use, the identity of the default button, and the modality of the message box. If omitted, the default value for buttons is 0.
title	Optional. String expression displayed in the title bar of the dialog box. If you omit title, the application name is placed in the title bar.
helpfile	Optional. String expression that identifies the Help file to use to provide context-sensitive Help for the dialog box. If helpfile is provided, context must also be provided.
context	Optional. Numeric expression that is the Help context number assigned to the appropriate Help topic by the Help author. If context is provided, helpfile must also be provided.

Settings

The buttons argument settings are:

Constant	Value		Description

vbOKOnly	0		Display OK button only.
vbOKCancel	1		Display OK and Cancel buttons.
vbAbortRetryIgnore	2		Display Abort, Retry, and Ignore buttons.
vbYesNoCancel	3		Display Yes, No, and Cancel buttons.
vbYesNo	4		Display Yes and No buttons.
vbRetryCancel	5		Display Retry and Cancel buttons.
vbCritical	16		Display Critical Message icon.
vbQuestion	32		Display Warning Query icon.
vbExclamation	48		Display Warning Message icon.
vbInformation	64		Display Information Message icon.
vbDefaultButton1	0		First button is default.
vbDefaultButton2	256		Second button is default.
vbDefaultButton3	512		Third button is default.
vbDefaultButton4	768		Fourth button is default.
vbApplicationModal		0	Application modal; the user must respond to the message box before continuing work in the current application.
vbSystemModal	4096		System modal; all applications are suspended until the user responds to the message box.

The first group of values (0–5) describes the number and type of buttons displayed in the dialog box; the second group (16, 32, 48, 64) describes the icon style; the third group (0, 256, 512) determines which button is the default; and the fourth group (0, 4096) determines the modality of the message box. When adding numbers to create a final value for the buttons argument, use only one number from each group.

Note These constants are specified by Visual Basic for Applications. As a result, the names can be used anywhere in your code in place of the actual values.

Return Values

Constant	Value		Description

vbOK	1	OK
vbCancel	2		Cancel
vbAbort	3		Abort
vbRetry	4		Retry
vbIgnore	5		Ignore
vbYes	6		Yes
vbNo	7		No

Remarks

When both helpfile and context are provided, the user can press F1 to view the Help topic corresponding to the context. Some host applications, for example, Microsoft Excel, also automatically add a Help button to the dialog box.

If the dialog box displays a Cancel button, pressing the ESC key has the same effect as clicking Cancel. If the dialog box contains a Help button, context-sensitive Help is provided for the dialog box. However, no value is returned until one of the other buttons is clicked.

Note To specify more than the first named argument, you must use MsgBox in an expression. To omit some positional arguments, you must include the corresponding comma delimiter.

See Also

InputBox function, MsgBox action.

Specifics (Microsoft Access)

You can use the MsgBox function in Microsoft Access to create a formatted error message similar to built-in error messages displayed by Microsoft Access. This function permits you to supply a string in three sections for the prompt argument. You separate the sections with the at sign (@).

The following example displays a formatted dialog box with a sectioned string. The first section of text in the string is displayed as a bold heading. The second section is displayed as plain text beneath that heading. The third section is displayed as plain text beneath the heading "Solution," which the function provides for you.

MsgBox "Wrong button!@This button doesn't work.@Try another.", _
    vbOKOnly + vbExclamation

Note To display a message box without an icon in Microsoft Access, simply omit any constant that would denote an icon, or supply a value of zero for the buttons argument, as in the following example.

MsgBox "No icons included.", 0

Specifics (Microsoft Excel)

In Microsoft Excel, the prompt string cannot contain more than 256 characters.

Example

This example uses the MsgBox function to display a critical-error message in a dialog box with Yes and No buttons. The No button is specified as the default response. The value returned by the MsgBox function depends on the button chosen by the user. This example assumes that DEMO.HLP is a Help file that contains a topic with a Help context number equal to 1000.

Dim Msg, Style, Title, Help, Ctxt, Response, MyString
Msg = "Do you want to continue ?"            ' Define message.
Style = vbYesNo + vbCritical + vbDefaultButton2    ' Define buttons.
Title = "MsgBox Demonstration"            ' Define title.
Help = "DEMO.HLP"                                ' Define Help file.
Ctxt = 1000                                        ' Define topic
                                                    ' context.
                                                    ' Display message.
Response = MsgBox(Msg, Style, Title, Help, Ctxt)
If Response = vbYes Then                        ' User chose Yes.
    MyString = "Yes"                            ' Perform some action.
Else                                                ' User chose No.
    MyString = "No"                                ' Perform some action.
End If

Example (Microsoft Access)

The following example uses the MsgBox function to create a formatted error message in Microsoft Access. Note the use of the at sign (@) to denote the different sections of the string.

Sub CustomMessage()
    Dim strMsg As String, strInput As String

    ' Initialize string.
    strMsg = "Number outside range.@You entered a number that is " _
        & "less than 1 or greater than 10.@Press OK to enter " _
        & "the number again."
    ' Prompt user for input.
    strInput = InputBox("Enter a number between 1 and 10.")
    ' Determine if user chose "Cancel".
    If strInput <> "" Then
        ' Test value of user input.
        Do While strInput < 0 Or strInput > 10
            If MsgBox(strMsg, vbOKCancel, "Error!") = vbOK Then
                strInput = InputBox("Enter a number between 1 and 10.")
            Else
                Exit Sub
            End If
        Loop
        ' Display user's correct input.
        MsgBox "You entered the number " & strInput & "."
    Else
        Exit Sub
    End If
End Sub