<< Click to Display Table of Contents >> Programming PlanMaker

Programming the word processor TextMaker and the spreadsheet program PlanMaker is practically identical. The only difference is that some keywords have different names (for example PlanMaker.Application instead of TextMaker.Application). If you have already worked through the section Programming TextMaker you will notice that the section you are currently reading is almost identical to it.

Naturally, the objects exposed by PlanMaker are different from those of TextMaker. A list of all objects exposed can be found in the next section, PlanMaker's object model.

To program PlanMaker with BasicMaker, you mainly use OLE Automation commands. General information on this subject can be found in section OLE Automation.

Follow this schematic outline (see below for details):

1.Declare a variable of type Object:

2.Make a connection to PlanMaker via OLE Automation (PlanMaker will be launched automatically if it is not already running):

3.Set the property Application.Visible to True so that PlanMaker becomes visible:

4.Now you can program PlanMaker by reading and writing its "properties" and by invoking the "methods" it provides.

5.As soon as the PlanMaker object is not required anymore, you should cut the connection to PlanMaker:

This was just a quick rundown of the necessary steps. More detailed information on programming PlanMaker follows on the next pages. A list of all PlanMaker objects and their respective properties and methods can be found in the section PlanMaker's object model.