Programming

An annoyed rant about Microsoft, which I don't usually do

Please pay no attention if you don't care

A guy at work asked me if I could figure out something in Excel which involves writing a macro. The macros are written in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA), which I think is different than regular Visual Basic and is for sure different from VBScript, which I'm most familiar with. I have been doing a lot of stuff at work with VBScript because one of our programs uses it to do things. I don't really like it but I don't have a choice. My main problem with it is just its structure, which seems stupid to my brain.

This is oversimplifying it, but to me there are two types of language: the Microsoft type and the C/Java type. I learned Java first, so it makes a lot of sense to me. It has a lot of punctuation in it. Microsoft types don't have any punctuation so it just seems stupid to me. Here's something in VBScript.

If x > 0 then

do something

end if

Here's something in PHP, which is the language I know best.

if (x > 0) {

do something;

}

Anyway VBA is a piece of crap. First of all, I cannot figure out the editor that's built into Excel. There are helpful hints which may or may not show up depending on where you click and what you have selected and what you had for lunch. You can record a macro, which is similar to Photoshop actions, where you hit record and then it records the actions you do and then you can modify them or use them to do tasks quickly. But the recording a macro thing seemed like it was making it way too difficult. So I set out to try to figure out how to write what I need to do, because it's not that hard.

First of all, I should be able to find a complete manual online. No such thing for VBA. I managed to get a downloadable version which doesn't really work correctly.

Secondly, wtf??? The manual has nothing in it! It has the same stuff that's in the "helpful hints", but how am I supposed to know where anything is? Most manuals are set up logically. For instance, they have functions grouped by what they're for - numbers, text, whatever. Then you click on that and you can see a list of functions, which usually have a short description by them, and at least you can probably tell what they do by their names. The VBA one has it alphabetically. What the hell? I have no idea what my thing is called that I need. Further, I do not know what they are called because I'm dealing with cells and crap, and I don't have any idea how to refer to them. Another thing that I have a major problem with: most manuals have a basic syntax thing as well as basic things you need to know, like how to say something is not equal to something! I CANNOT find how to say not equal. And it apparently isn't !=, which is how you do it in VBScript. That gave me an error.

I feel really lost right now. And annoyed, because of the fact that they don't include how to say not equal in their stupid language. Why isn't everything immediately accessible to me whenever I want it?

I realize it's probably because no Microsoft thing is open source, but you'd think that the manual would at least be available and halfway decent. Seriously, I don't think I can use it at all.