The Excel ribbon can be modified to suit a particular job. This exercise creates new menus that point users to specific sheets relevant to their task.
In this article, we will introduce how to create customized menus in your Excel worksheet, like this:
This article assumes the reader has the Developer ribbon displayed and is familiar with the VBA Editor. If not, please Google “Excel Developer Tab” or “Excel Code Window”.
Workbook
The workbook to be used has a number of sheets. We suggest you use the sample one found here. It looks like this.
The first four sheets are dysfunctional, being used in this exercise for navigation purposes only.
The fifth sheet will hold the customised menu structure particular to this workbook. At present it should be blank except for a Test button.
Add the Menu Structure
Copy the following block of text into cell A1 of the sheet “MenuSheet”.
Level,Caption,Position/Macro,Divider
1,&User Tools,10
2,Show Dashboard,SelectDashboard
2,Add new, ,TRUE
3,Client,SelectClient
3,Location,SelectLocation
3,Manager,SelectManager
2,Close,CloseFile
Format the Menu Structure
This CSV data ends up in column A. To format it into individual Excel cells, select column A and using ‘Text to columns’ in the Data tab. The delimiter would be “comma”.
The above, once we have added the appropriate code, will give us the level-based menu structure at left.
The first level, in this exercise, is arbitrarily placed as the tenth item on the menu bar, as you will see when the full width of the workbook is displayed.
Creating and Destroying Menus
Since we only want the new menus for this specific workbook, we will create and destroy them on opening and closing the workbook.
The code below is a start. It will be triggered when the workbook is opened or closed. Copy it into a module in your workbook
Assign the Test button on MenuSheet to Auto_Open.
Option Explicit Sub auto_Open() Call DeleteMenu Call CreateMenu End Sub Sub auto_Close() Call DeleteMenu End Sub
Below, we examine our menu structure more closely.
No macro is triggered by Add New because it has no function other than as parent of sub-menus.
This kind of menu structure is easy to maintain. Simply add new items with their macros, being conscious of the menu Level.
The Code
Append the following VBA code to the module. This will examine the “MenuSheet” and create the customised menu.
Sub CreateMenu() ' Called from Auto_Open. 'NOTE: There is no error handling in this subroutine Dim MenuSheet As Worksheet Dim MenuObject As CommandBarPopup Dim MenuItem As Object Dim SubMenuItem As CommandBarButton Dim sRow As Integer Dim MenuLevel, NextLevel, PositionOrMacro, Caption, Divider Set MenuSheet = ThisWorkbook.Sheets("MenuSheet") Call DeleteMenu sRow = 2 ' start row ' Add menus using the structure as per the MenuSheet Range("A" & sRow).Select Do While ActiveCell > "" '**************** With MenuSheet MenuLevel = .Cells(sRow, 1) Caption = .Cells(sRow, 2) PositionOrMacro = .Cells(sRow, 3) Divider = .Cells(sRow, 4) NextLevel = .Cells(sRow + 1, 1) End With Select Case MenuLevel Case 1 ' Add the top-level menu to the Worksheet CommandBar Set MenuObject = Application.CommandBars(1). _ Controls.Add(Type:=msoControlPopup, _ Before:=PositionOrMacro, _ Temporary:=True) MenuObject.Caption = Caption Case 2 ' A Menu Item If NextLevel = 3 Then Set MenuItem = MenuObject.Controls.Add(Type:=msoControlPopup) Else Set MenuItem = MenuObject.Controls.Add(Type:=msoControlButton) MenuItem.OnAction = PositionOrMacro End If MenuItem.Caption = Caption If Divider Then MenuItem.BeginGroup = True Case 3 ' A SubMenu Item Set SubMenuItem = MenuItem.Controls.Add(Type:=msoControlButton) SubMenuItem.Caption = Caption SubMenuItem.OnAction = PositionOrMacro If Divider Then SubMenuItem.BeginGroup = True End Select sRow = sRow + 1 Range("A" & sRow).Select '*************************************** Loop Sheets("Dashboard").Activate End Sub Sub DeleteMenu() ' This sub will be executed when the workbook is closing Dim MenuSheet As Worksheet Dim sRow As Integer Dim Caption As String On Error Resume Next Set MenuSheet = ThisWorkbook.Sheets("MenuSheet") sRow = 2 Range("A" & sRow).Select Do While ActiveCell > "" If MenuSheet.Cells(sRow, 1) = 1 Then Caption = MenuSheet.Cells(sRow, 2) Application.CommandBars(1).Controls(Caption).Delete End If sRow = sRow + 1 Range("A" & sRow).Select Loop On Error GoTo 0 End Sub Sub SelectDashboard() Sheets("Dashboard").Activate End Sub Sub SelectClient() Sheets("Client").Activate End Sub Sub SelectLocation() Sheets("Location").Activate End Sub Sub SelectManager() Sheets("Manager").Activate End Sub Sub CloseFile() MsgBox "Close! (write your own code in the module)" End Sub
Test the code with the Test button. The newly created user menu will be found at menu position 10, under Add-ins.
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