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#1
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Migration of Excel Add-in
Hi,
My customers use the excel add-in provided by us to build their models. That is they use the functions exposed by the add-in to build their own macros, formulae, etc. Now we're bringing out the newer version of excel add-in with substantial changes. This new add-in would have to replace the old add-in in a seamless fashion without customers making any change to their macros and formulas. To offer this, we're thinking of a migration tool that would allow us to convert each of the customers macros/formula to be compatible with new add-in. For e.g. if the old add-in exposed a function called Add() and the new add-in deprecates the Add() but introduces AddX(), the migration tool has to identify each call to the deprecated method in the customer macro/formula and replace the same with AddX(). I'm trying to see whether anyone has experience is doing something like that and what are the best practices to be followed for the same. FYI, the customer macros/formulas are expected to be complex. Any suggestions on this regard are highly appreciated. Thanks, Phani |
#3
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Migration of Excel Add-in
You want to go through the client's worksheets and modules and replace all
instances of Add() with AddX()? My first thought is, are you out of your mind? You have to make sure you get them all, even in protected sheets, workbooks, and VB projects, without breaking any existing functionality. I'd say you have less than 1% probability of pulling it off. Unless AddX introduces radically different behavior (as opposed to enhanced functionality) you should simply keep using Add() with additional optional arguments to enable the newer features. At the very least, leave Add() in place, and introduce AddX() as an enhanced version. Let the users replace Add() with AddX() if desired and if necessary, or provide a feature that will do it selectively on a given worksheet or workbook, with the ability to switch backwards as well. - Jon ------- Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP Tutorials and Custom Solutions Peltier Technical Services, Inc. - http://PeltierTech.com _______ "Phanidhar" wrote in message ... Hi, My customers use the excel add-in provided by us to build their models. That is they use the functions exposed by the add-in to build their own macros, formulae, etc. Now we're bringing out the newer version of excel add-in with substantial changes. This new add-in would have to replace the old add-in in a seamless fashion without customers making any change to their macros and formulas. To offer this, we're thinking of a migration tool that would allow us to convert each of the customers macros/formula to be compatible with new add-in. For e.g. if the old add-in exposed a function called Add() and the new add-in deprecates the Add() but introduces AddX(), the migration tool has to identify each call to the deprecated method in the customer macro/formula and replace the same with AddX(). I'm trying to see whether anyone has experience is doing something like that and what are the best practices to be followed for the same. FYI, the customer macros/formulas are expected to be complex. Any suggestions on this regard are highly appreciated. Thanks, Phani |
#4
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Migration of Excel Add-in
Thank you, Jon for your comments. I do agree that its not a trivial job to
pull-off the conversion. In fact, I've proposed other solutions which are transparent to the customer and the conversion/re-direction is handled at a different layer. Having said that, I would still look for solution that would replace my all reference to the old add-in calls to new reference calls. I can propose this solution if the customer models are not too complicated. So what I'm asking at a technical level is if there is a way I can: 1. Get the list of all references of a excel add-in function used in a sheet( lets ignore VB projects) 2. Replace those calls with the ones new call 3. Sanity check for unresolved references Thanks in advance, Phani "Jon Peltier" wrote: You want to go through the client's worksheets and modules and replace all instances of Add() with AddX()? My first thought is, are you out of your mind? You have to make sure you get them all, even in protected sheets, workbooks, and VB projects, without breaking any existing functionality. I'd say you have less than 1% probability of pulling it off. Unless AddX introduces radically different behavior (as opposed to enhanced functionality) you should simply keep using Add() with additional optional arguments to enable the newer features. At the very least, leave Add() in place, and introduce AddX() as an enhanced version. Let the users replace Add() with AddX() if desired and if necessary, or provide a feature that will do it selectively on a given worksheet or workbook, with the ability to switch backwards as well. - Jon ------- Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP Tutorials and Custom Solutions Peltier Technical Services, Inc. - http://PeltierTech.com _______ "Phanidhar" wrote in message ... Hi, My customers use the excel add-in provided by us to build their models. That is they use the functions exposed by the add-in to build their own macros, formulae, etc. Now we're bringing out the newer version of excel add-in with substantial changes. This new add-in would have to replace the old add-in in a seamless fashion without customers making any change to their macros and formulas. To offer this, we're thinking of a migration tool that would allow us to convert each of the customers macros/formula to be compatible with new add-in. For e.g. if the old add-in exposed a function called Add() and the new add-in deprecates the Add() but introduces AddX(), the migration tool has to identify each call to the deprecated method in the customer macro/formula and replace the same with AddX(). I'm trying to see whether anyone has experience is doing something like that and what are the best practices to be followed for the same. FYI, the customer macros/formulas are expected to be complex. Any suggestions on this regard are highly appreciated. Thanks, Phani |
#5
Posted to microsoft.public.excel.programming
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Migration of Excel Add-in
On the rare occasions when I've done this. my approach has included
(a) backing up the original workbooks (b) executing a Find-Replace to change "Add(" to "AddX(" (c) looking for cells which were okay and now contain errors (d) running through these workbooks to make sure everything seems okay. - Jon ------- Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP Tutorials and Custom Solutions Peltier Technical Services, Inc. - http://PeltierTech.com _______ "Phanidhar" wrote in message ... Thank you, Jon for your comments. I do agree that its not a trivial job to pull-off the conversion. In fact, I've proposed other solutions which are transparent to the customer and the conversion/re-direction is handled at a different layer. Having said that, I would still look for solution that would replace my all reference to the old add-in calls to new reference calls. I can propose this solution if the customer models are not too complicated. So what I'm asking at a technical level is if there is a way I can: 1. Get the list of all references of a excel add-in function used in a sheet( lets ignore VB projects) 2. Replace those calls with the ones new call 3. Sanity check for unresolved references Thanks in advance, Phani "Jon Peltier" wrote: You want to go through the client's worksheets and modules and replace all instances of Add() with AddX()? My first thought is, are you out of your mind? You have to make sure you get them all, even in protected sheets, workbooks, and VB projects, without breaking any existing functionality. I'd say you have less than 1% probability of pulling it off. Unless AddX introduces radically different behavior (as opposed to enhanced functionality) you should simply keep using Add() with additional optional arguments to enable the newer features. At the very least, leave Add() in place, and introduce AddX() as an enhanced version. Let the users replace Add() with AddX() if desired and if necessary, or provide a feature that will do it selectively on a given worksheet or workbook, with the ability to switch backwards as well. - Jon ------- Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP Tutorials and Custom Solutions Peltier Technical Services, Inc. - http://PeltierTech.com _______ "Phanidhar" wrote in message ... Hi, My customers use the excel add-in provided by us to build their models. That is they use the functions exposed by the add-in to build their own macros, formulae, etc. Now we're bringing out the newer version of excel add-in with substantial changes. This new add-in would have to replace the old add-in in a seamless fashion without customers making any change to their macros and formulas. To offer this, we're thinking of a migration tool that would allow us to convert each of the customers macros/formula to be compatible with new add-in. For e.g. if the old add-in exposed a function called Add() and the new add-in deprecates the Add() but introduces AddX(), the migration tool has to identify each call to the deprecated method in the customer macro/formula and replace the same with AddX(). I'm trying to see whether anyone has experience is doing something like that and what are the best practices to be followed for the same. FYI, the customer macros/formulas are expected to be complex. Any suggestions on this regard are highly appreciated. Thanks, Phani |
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