Thanks again for the help. At least the fix worked however I stumbled across
it. What I am writing now is "demo" code -- I will go back later if and when
I need to expand/improve on the app and see if I can figure out why the
unqualified range problem popped up.

"Tom Ogilvy" wrote:

No, the unqualified range in a general module would refer to the active
sheet regardless of which workbook is running the code. This is one the the
ways one would generalize their code.

--
Regards,
Tom Ogilvy

"in-over-his-head-bill" wrote
in message ...
Thank you for your help. I didn't entirely follow your response (hence my
name in-over-his-head...) But,

the public sub manageoutput_exists() is in a general module (module1).

Public variables (declared in the general module) savetofile and
savetorange
are given values based on a user double-click on a list box value
contained
in a userform. Also in userform_activate I open the 2nd workbook as
follows:
Workbooks.Open(savetofile).Activate.

I have a command button on the initial worksheet the user sees when
opening
up this app. The following code is the only code I have in a sheet module:

Private Sub cmd1_Click()
Call setglobalvars 'sets connection, opens connection
Set formproxy = UserForms.Add("frm_rptmenu")
formproxy.Show
End Sub

Does any of this cause the unqualified range reference even though I have
most of the code in the general module?

Bill


"Tom Ogilvy" wrote:

Obviously you have your code in the Thisworkbook module or a sheet
module.
However, code like this:

Public Sub manageoutput_exists()


shouldn't be in one of those modules, but in a general module. It
certainly
occured to me that the problem could be caused by that, but when I
checked
your declaration, it wasn't an event (the only thing which should be in
these
modules), so I discounted that as the problem. (too hasty on my part)

The cause is that an unqualified range reference located in a sheet
module
refers to that sheet. You have stumbled into the solution of qualifying
it.
In a general module, and unqualified range reference refers to the active
sheet.

--
Regards,
Tom Ogilvy


"in-over-his-head-bill" wrote:

I figured out a fix late last night without understanding why I needed
the
fix. By hardcoding some range values instead of assigning the recordset
to
the range, I discovered that even though WorkBook 2 was the active
workbook;
it was trying to place the newly created range on Workbook 1 (I am
still not
sure why it errored out as opposed to just putting the range on WB 1).
I
replaced all my Range... statements with
Worksheet(wz).Range ...
where wz=Range(the user specified range name in Workbook
2).Worksheet.Name
and it works.

Thanks to all for all their help.

"Tom Ogilvy" wrote:

ww = "$A$1"
j = 0
? Range(ww).Offset(0, j).Address
$A$1


--
Regards,
Tom Ogilvy


"in-over-his-head-bill" wrote:

Thanks for the help; still don't see the answer.
in the debugger
j is 0
recset.fields.count=4
ww = $a$1
and recset(j).Name='effmonth'

when I position float the cursor over the whole line In the
debugger I get
range(ww).Offset(0,j).Value=<Method 'range' of object '_global'
failed

Is range($a$1).Offset(0,0) an ok statement?


"JLatham" wrote:

When it bombs out, enter Debug and see what 'j' evaluates to and
check to see
what each side of the equation evaluates to - either Offset(0,j)
is illegal,
or something is really odd with the recset.Fields.Count value.
Since the
second option should, in theory, never be invalid or illegal, I
suspect that
you're offsetting into an invalid column. Look at ww at that
point, look at
value of j and make sure that the resultant column is legitimate.

"in-over-his-head-bill" wrote:

I am getting the subject line error, but only ocassionally when
I run my code
-- and I can't figure out a pattern to when it bombs and when
it doesn't.

My code is in workbook 1, I open a user-specified workbook 2,
which is the
active workbook when it reaches this sub. I am trying to
replace the data in
the user-specified range in workbook 2 with new data from a
recordset and
save to the same range name.

savetorange is a public string variable containing the
user-specified range
name.

Can anyone see what is wrong with the code below? Thanks.

Public Sub manageoutput_exists()

Dim rngResultSet As Range
Dim ww As Variant

' get upper-left most cell of the current range in workbook 2
ww = Range(savetorange).Cells(1, 1).Address

'delete the range
Range(savetorange).Delete

'add field headers from the results of the sql query

For j = 0 To recset.Fields.Count - 1
-next line bombs
Range(ww).Offset(0, j).Value = recset(j).Name
Next j

'copy the recordset data below the headers
ww = Range(ww).Offset(1, 0).Address
Range(ww).CopyFromRecordset recset

Set rngResultSet =
Range(ww).End(xlDown).End(xlToRight).CurrentRegion
rngResultSet.Name = savetorange
ActiveWorkbook.Save


End Sub