Hi folks,

Im writing my current program in Excel 2002 with VBA. Its still in the
early days but I intend to incorporate some MS Word elements aswell.

One of my books puts Excel useage at: [Excel 97 - 10%] [Excel 2000 - 45%]
[Excel 2002 - 40%] and [Excel 2003 - 5%]. Obviously Excel 2007 is out now,
and I can only assume that useage for it is still low in proportion.

I'm wondering when the time arrives, how I can test my program is newer
versions of Excel than 2002....and possibly even test it in 2000. Do I need
to own all the versions which I want to test in?

Do I need to test in different windows versions aswell?

What about people running Excel on a Mac...can I test for that without
buying a Mac?

How do the MVP's usually test their programs...do you or your company own
all versions for testing? Thats not economically viable for me at this point.

Thanks.

You don't have to "own" the versions, just have access to them. If you have
versions A (oldest) thru versions N(newest) of any software program, your
code written for version A may well run in all versions thru version N
because of "backwards" compatibility. But if you write your code for version
N, it is almost guaranteed not to run in version A. In other words, in
software as in life, you can never go back. The only way to be certain your
code runs in all versions is to test your code in all versions.

Tyro

"dim" wrote in message
...
Hi folks,

Im writing my current program in Excel 2002 with VBA. Its still in the
early days but I intend to incorporate some MS Word elements aswell.

One of my books puts Excel useage at: [Excel 97 - 10%] [Excel 2000 - 45%]
[Excel 2002 - 40%] and [Excel 2003 - 5%]. Obviously Excel 2007 is out now,
and I can only assume that useage for it is still low in proportion.

I'm wondering when the time arrives, how I can test my program is newer
versions of Excel than 2002....and possibly even test it in 2000. Do I
need
to own all the versions which I want to test in?

Do I need to test in different windows versions aswell?

What about people running Excel on a Mac...can I test for that without
buying a Mac?

How do the MVP's usually test their programs...do you or your company own
all versions for testing? Thats not economically viable for me at this
point.

Thanks.

dim -

Do I need to own all the versions which I want to test in? <

You need to have access to all appropriate versions of Excel, or you need to
have reliable external testers who have such access. I develop my add-ins
mostly in Excel 97 SR2, and I test in all subsequent versions of Windows
Excel using versions available on my many Windows computers.

Do I need to test in different windows versions as well? <

My add-ins run entirely within the Excel environment, so I usually do not
bother to explicitly test with different versions of Windows. If my add-ins
did use file commands or other not-just-inside-Excel features, then I would
test in different versions of Windows. An exception for me is that I did
test Excel 2007 in Windows Vista (in addition to Windows XP), primarily
because for the 2007/Vista setup I have to write explicit user guide
installation instructions to help the user get through the various extra
security features.

What about people running Excel on a Mac...can I test for that without
buying a Mac? <

Once again, you'll need access to a Mac or a reliable someone with a Mac.
Keep in mind that the version of VBA in Mac Excel X and Mac Excel 2004 is
older than the version of VBA on current Windows Excel (which is another
reason why I still develop with Excel 97). Also, I used a Mac to design
separate dialog boxes that look somewhat acceptable to Mac users. An example
is the initialization code behind the user form in the Better Histogram
add-in (free and unprotected), available from the Histogram page at
www.treeplan.com. The histogram add-in detects whether it's running on Mac
or Windows and then uses appropriate settings for the dialog box. (The next
version of Mac Excel (2008) will not support VBA add-ins.)

How do the MVP's usually test their programs...do you or your company own
all versions for testing? <

I work at three different locations, each with at least one complete
development system, and I've accumulated quite a few desktop and portable
computers over the years. So, yes, I do own all versions for testing.

- Mike Middleton
http://www.DecisionToolworks.com
Decision Analysis Add-ins for Excel



"dim" wrote in message
...
Hi folks,

Im writing my current program in Excel 2002 with VBA. Its still in the
early days but I intend to incorporate some MS Word elements aswell.

One of my books puts Excel useage at: [Excel 97 - 10%] [Excel 2000 - 45%]
[Excel 2002 - 40%] and [Excel 2003 - 5%]. Obviously Excel 2007 is out now,
and I can only assume that useage for it is still low in proportion.

I'm wondering when the time arrives, how I can test my program is newer
versions of Excel than 2002....and possibly even test it in 2000. Do I
need
to own all the versions which I want to test in?

Do I need to test in different windows versions aswell?

What about people running Excel on a Mac...can I test for that without
buying a Mac?

How do the MVP's usually test their programs...do you or your company own
all versions for testing? Thats not economically viable for me at this
point.

Thanks.

Mon, 7 Jan 2008 15:36:03 -0800 from dim
:
One of my books puts Excel useage at: [Excel 97 - 10%] [Excel 2000
- 45%] [Excel 2002 - 40%] and [Excel 2003 - 5%].

That book is seriously out of date, as any book must be that tracks
usage (note spelling) of changing versions of a product.

The great majority of my customers have Excel 2003 -- I'd guess
around 75%. There are maybe 10% for Excel 2000 and 2002 combined, and
about 15% Excel 2007. Those are just my impressions; I haven't
counted. :-)

--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://OakRoadSystems.com/
"If there's one thing I know, it's men. I ought to: it's
been my life work." -- Marie Dressler, in /Dinner at Eight/

Thanks for all the info folks. Its good to know. I was hoping there was a
program I could buy which would test for compatibility....oh well, that would
be too easy! lol The book mentions that it was an unscientific poll taken
from the MS Newsgroups, but I won't say what book it is.

L8rs.