How do I send a VB command to Word that calls a Macro that requires a value

[deleted_user]

I have a SAS Macro that constructs VB commands to send to Word, but I'm stuck on trying to call a Word Macro that requires a value passed to it (such as: call prt_pgs_rng ("1-10"). I keep getting a Word Compile error.

Any thoughts?

[deleted_user]

more details please! are you invoking the Word Macro from SAS or within Word? If it's the former case, are you using DDE? listing the code would be helpful too.

[deleted_user]

I'm using DDE to send VB commands to Word to print all or selected pages of the current Word Document. If I invoke a Word Macro that does not require any values passed to it, it works fine. But, if the Word Macro requires a value to be passed to it (such as the range of pages to be printed) it fails.

These are the two Word Macros that I'm working with:

Sub prt_pgs_all()
' Print All Pages in Current Document
Application.PrintOut FileName:="", Range:=wdPrintAllDocument, Item:= _
wdPrintDocumentContent, Copies:=1, Pages:="", PageType:=wdPrintAllPages, _
ManualDuplexPrint:=False, Collate:=True, Background:=True, PrintToFile:= _
False, PrintZoomColumn:=0, PrintZoomRow:=0, PrintZoomPaperWidth:=0, _
PrintZoomPaperHeight:=0
End Sub

Sub prt_pgs_rng(stPg As String)
' Print a Range of Pages in Current Document
' "1-1" = Print Page 1
' "1-10" = Print First 10 pages
Application.PrintOut FileName:="", Range:=wdPrintRangeOfPages, Item:= _
wdPrintDocumentContent, Copies:=1, Pages:=stPg, PageType:=wdPrintAllPages, _
ManualDuplexPrint:=False, Collate:=True, Background:=True, PrintToFile:= _
False, PrintZoomColumn:=0, PrintZoomRow:=0, PrintZoomPaperWidth:=0, _
PrintZoomPaperHeight:=0
End Sub

To print all pages I send the following comand:
put '[call prt_pgs_all]'; - this works fine
To print only the first page I send the following command:
put '[call prt_pgs_rng ("1-1")]'; - this does not work

In Word I get a Compile error saying the Sub or Function is not Found and it displays the following code:

Private Sub TmpDDE
prt_pgs_rng__ ("1-1")
End Sub

Note the underscores appended to the macro name - not sure where they came from, but when I remove them and continue the Subroutine works.

If you can shed some light I'd appreciate it.

[deleted_user]

according to http://www2.sas.com/proceedings/sugi29/034-29.pdf, you may send via DDE only Word Commands or VBA subroutines without parameters.

So as a work-around, you may just use the following put statement in SAS,
put '[FilePrint .Pages="1-10"];

Years have passed since that paper, there might be better techniques, but I don't know.

[deleted_user]

Thanks for your response

You answered one question - it seems you can't call a Word macro that passes parameters

Your workaround makes sense and I could modify the statement within SAS to define the range of pages, but when I tried it as you described it it didn't work.

Do you have any more suggestions?

[deleted_user]

I don't know why it wouldn't work for you. I'm using Office 2003, and here's an example.
/*
options noxwait noxsync;
data _null_;
call system('start winword');
rc = sleep(2);
run;
filename sas2word dde 'winword|system';

data _null_;
file sas2word;
put '[appactivate("Document1 - Microsoft Word")]';
put 'abcdefg';
put '[sendkeys("^a")]'
'[sendkeys("%o")]'
'[sendkeys("f")]'
'[sendkeys("Comic Sans MS")]'
'[sendkeys("{tab}")]'
'[sendkeys("bold")]'
'[sendkeys("{tab}")]'
'[sendkeys("20")]'
'[sendkeys("%k")]'
'[sendkeys("{enter}")]'
;
put '[fileprint .pages="1-1"]'; *there is a space between fileprint and .pages;
put '[filesaveas("n:\test.doc")]';
put '[filequit()]';
run;
*/
I used only WordBasic functions. Because I don't want to look up very much the reference, I used SendKeys to send key strokes to Word. This function is capable of almost anything, but the key strokes need to be sent in proper order.
For a complete list of WordBasic functions, please go to http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=1A24B2A7-31AE-4B7C-A377-45A8E2C70AB2&displa....

[deleted_user]

Hi Urchin,

Thanks for sticking with me on this...

I'm sorry I should have been more specific on how the command didn't work. My file printed, but it printed all the pages - not the range specified.

I tried your code - changing it to read in a file that contained two pages and it still printed out the whole document instead of just the first page.

options noxwait noxsync;
data _null_;
call system('start winword');
rc = sleep(2);
run;
filename sas2word dde 'winword|system';

data _null_;
file sas2word;
put '[fileopen .name = "n:\test.doc"]';
put '[fileprint .pages="1-1"]'; *there is a space between fileprint and .pages;
/*put '[filesaveas("n:\test.doc")]';*/
put '[filequit()]';
run;

So the Print command works, but the pages parameter doesn't.

[deleted_user]

Sorry I didn't read the WordBasic help document carefully. You need one more argument to print a range of pages. For example,
put '[fileprint .range=4 .pages="2-2"]';

Or, the sendkeys work-around is
put '[sendkeys("^p")]'
'[sendkeys("%g")]'
'[sendkeys("2-2")]'
'[sendkeys("{enter}")]'
;

Hope it helps.

[deleted_user]

Thank you so much for your help.

The put statement worked with the .range parameter. The only question I have is what does that parameter define and should it always have a value of 4?

[deleted_user]

Nevermind - I was able to find some documentation that explained it. A .range value of 4 indicates you are going to use .pages to define the range. A .range value of 3 indicates you are going to use .from and .to to define the range.

How cool is that!

My SAS macro now reads in a .lst file, formats it (calling a pre-defined Word Macro), saves it as a .doc file and optionally, prints all or a range of pages.

Thanks again for your help!