Posts Tagged ‘COM add-ins’
Customizing Word User Interface: What is and isn’t customizable
Ty Anderson | July 17th, 2013
But for the advanced user who views Word as essential to their daily grind at the office… Word needs to do some adjusting to the user. This user has well defined grooves in their workday. They work spans across multiple teams, departments, companies, and applications. Microsoft Word can be a player in these processes and you can put Word in the best position possible. But how?... Read the rest of this entry →
Word add-in development in Visual Studio: Application and base objects
Ty Anderson | July 8th, 2013
In this article, the first in a series of Word development topics, I'll cover Microsoft Word application and base objects. And, as is our tradition, I'll provide relevant code samples for Word 2013 - 2000 you can copy and paste into your solutions... Read the rest of this entry →
Automating Word Mail Merge in Visual Studio – C# sample
Pieter van der Westhuizen | July 5th, 2013
The Mail Merge functionality in Microsoft Word is one of the most powerful features that enables you to create, amongst other things, simple form letters. It is, however, one of the tricky things to get your head around when trying to automate it in either an Office add-in or a stand-alone application using the Word Object model... Read the rest of this entry →
Developing powerful Outlook add-ins with Visual Studio (VB.NET, C#)
Ty Anderson | July 2nd, 2013
With the recent Beginning Outlook Development series complete, we thought it would be a good idea to do a demo that shows how easy/simple/relatively painless it is to build a powerful Outlook add-in with Visual Studio ... Read the rest of this entry →
Working with Outlook Accounts, Stores, Folders and Items
Pieter van der Westhuizen | May 31st, 2013
Any user of Microsoft Outlook will tell you that you cannot use Outlook without first setting up an account. This account can either be an Exchange server, POP or IMAP account, although Outlook can support any MAPI style account too.... Read the rest of this entry →
Advanced Outlook form regions for Outlook 2013 – 2000
Ty Anderson | May 30th, 2013
As great as Outlook is, it was not designed to meet 100% of any one user's needs. Therefore, users constantly think of ideas for how we developers can "trick it out". And what do they want? They want custom Outlook forms!... Read the rest of this entry →
Creating a custom ribbon for Outlook 2013, 2010 and toolbar for Outlook 2007, 2003 – C# sample
Pieter van der Westhuizen | May 21st, 2013
The Outlook UI provides a lot of customization options, but one thing almost all Outlook add-ins share is either a ribbon tab or a toolbar or two. The Ribbon UI was introduced in Office 2007 although only the Inspector windows actually used it. The Explorer window still used the traditional menus and toolbars from previous Outlook versions... Read the rest of this entry →
Customizing Outlook main menu, context menus and Backstage view
Ty Anderson | May 13th, 2013
Often, the focus of an Outlook add-in centers around a custom ribbon or form region. I think this makes sense. They are sexy, upfront, and what everyone wants to see. But they are not enough. A good Outlook solution should provide other user interface customizations that allow the user to execute your solution's logic. These other methods are, arguably, the less-sexy, more utilitarian UI components. I am referring of course to the main menu, context menus, and the backstage.... Read the rest of this entry →
Video: Develop Office 2013 add-ins with Visual Studio 2012 Express
Ty Anderson | April 30th, 2013
In this video, I show how to create an add-in for Microsoft Office 2013 Outlook, Excel and Word and add a custom ribbon using Add-in Express for Office and .net with Visual Studio Express 2012. Enjoy!... Read the rest of this entry →
The Outlook UI: Explorer and Inspector Windows. What is customizable?
Pieter van der Westhuizen | April 29th, 2013
It can take some time to familiarize yourself and understand the various different components of the Outlook UI. Outlook is made up of windows, panes and forms. The two types of Outlook windows are Explorer and Inspector windows... Read the rest of this entry →
Outlook views: How to create a custom view for calendar, task, mail items
Pieter van der Westhuizen | April 18th, 2013
Outlook views allow you to group, sort and view all the different types of Outlook data within the View panel of the Outlook Explorer window. Outlook comes with a few built-in views for each Outlook item type (mail, task, calendar, etc.) which can be accessed via the View tab... Read the rest of this entry →
Outlook 2013 add-in development for beginners: Outlook Application & base objects
Ty Anderson | April 17th, 2013
Working with a new framework takes time as you familiarize yourself with its architecture and best practices. You have to spend time discovering objects, learning what they do, and when it is best to utilize them. For Outlook add-in development (and Microsoft Office development in general), this task can take months due to the number of objects involved... Read the rest of this entry →
Create Office add-ins with Visual Studio 2012 Express
Dmitry Kostochko | April 9th, 2013
Today I am going to break our long-time tradition of announcing major version releases only with the announcement of the new minor update of Add-in Express for Office and .net. "What is special about this build?" you may ask me. Well, I have the answer. Apart from minor improvements and bug fixes the new build (7.2.4055) adds support for Visual Studio Express 2012 for Windows Desktop... Read the rest of this entry →
Excel 2013 add-ins in Visual Studio 2012: Getting started for VSTO developers
Pieter van der Westhuizen | April 8th, 2013
In this article we'll have a look at how you, as a VSTO developer, can get started developing add-ins for Excel using Add-in Express and Visual Studio 2012.... Read the rest of this entry →
Enterprise development of Office solutions with Add-in Express
Ty Anderson | March 29th, 2013
Microsoft Office based solutions take various forms and sizes. What began with the ability to write (and record) scripts to automate Office documents on a user's desktop has evolved to the ability to create full-fledged extensions. These extensions often work across multiple apps in the Office suite and expand beyond a single user's desktop.... Read the rest of this entry →
Outlook 2013 add-ins and Visual Studio 2012: Getting started for VSTO developers
Pieter van der Westhuizen | March 28th, 2013
Today we'll focus on how developers, coming from a Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) background, can get started developing add-ins for Outlook 2013 using Add-in Express and Visual Studio 2012 (C#, VB.NET or C++.NET).... Read the rest of this entry →