XL: Visual Basic Macro to Show Active Cell's Range Names

ID: Q131922

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Excel for Windows, versions 5.0, 5.0c
Microsoft Excel for Windows 95, version 7.0
Microsoft Excel 97 for Windows
Microsoft Excel for Windows NT, version 5.0
Microsoft Excel for the Macintosh, versions 5.0, 5.0a
Microsoft Excel 98 Macintosh Edition

SUMMARY

This article contains a sample Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications macro (Sub procedure) that finds all named ranges that contain the active cell on a worksheet and displays the names in a series of message boxes.

MORE INFORMATION

Microsoft provides programming examples for illustration only, without warranty either expressed or implied, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability and/or fitness for a particular purpose. This article assumes that you are familiar with the programming language being demonstrated and the tools used to create and debug procedures. Microsoft support professionals can help explain the functionality of a particular procedure, but they will not modify these examples to provide added functionality or construct procedures to meet your specific needs. If you have limited programming experience, you may want to contact the Microsoft fee-based consulting line at (800) 936-5200. For more information about the support options available from Microsoft, please see the following page on the World Wide Web:

http://www.microsoft.com/support/supportnet/overview/overview.asp

This sample macro loops through all the names in the active workbook and checks to see if the range name is referring to the active sheet. It then uses the Intersect method to determine if the range name includes the active cell. This is done by setting an object variable equal to the intersection of the active cell and the named range. If the two ranges intersect, the TypeName of the object variable is "Range". If they do not intersect, the TypeName of the object variable is "Nothing".

If the macro finds a range name that includes the active cell, it displays a message box showing the range name. Once all names have been checked, the macro displays a message box showing that there are "No More Names."

Sample Visual Basic Procedure


Sub Find_Names()

   ' Loop through all names in workbook.
   For Each n In ActiveWorkbook.Names

   ' Set Error Handling so macro will not fail when it
   ' encounters a name that does not refer to a worksheet range.
   On Error Resume Next
   ' Check to see if the name refers to the ActiveSheet.
   If Mid(n.RefersTo, 2, InStr(n.RefersTo, "!") - 2) = _
      ActiveSheet.Name Then
      ' If name refers to ActiveSheet, then find the intersection of the
      ' named range and the ActiveCell.
      ' If the ActiveCell is in the named range, "y" will equal "Range",
      ' otherwise y equals "".
      Set y = Intersect(ActiveCell, Range(n.RefersTo))
      ' Display a message box if the ActiveCell is in the named range.
         If TypeName(y) = "Range" Then MsgBox "Cell is in : " & n.Name
   End If
   Next
   MsgBox "No More Names!"   ' Display message when finished.
End Sub

REFERENCES

"Visual Basic User's Guide," version 5.0, Chapter 7, "Controlling How Your Code Runs"

For more information on using looping in Visual Basic macros, click the Search button in Programming with Visual Basic Help and type:

Loops

For additional information about getting help with Visual Basic for Applications, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q163435 VBA: Programming Resources for Visual Basic for Applications

Additional query words: XL97 looping 8.0

Keywords : kbprg kbdta kbdtacode PgmHowto PgmLoop KbVBA
Version : MACINTOSH:5.0,5.0a; WINDOWS:5.0,5.0c,7.0; winnt:5.0
Platform : MACINTOSH WINDOWS winnt
Issue type : kbhowto