Activate Ribbon Tab In Excel 2007 2010 *

**Excel Fox** · 04-21-2011, 04:31 PM

One can access the Ribbon by using Commandbars("Ribbon") that will return an IAccessible object. You can access the tabs using the oleacc.dll library which can return an array of other IAccessible objects which are basically the list of all child elements. So the first child of the ribbon would be its tab. Using the IDs (which are strings) of these children objects you can filter in to the next child level which can be menu items etc.

Credit to Tony Jollans, Microsoft Word MVP for the ribbon demo that you can find at www.WordArticles.com

Here you can download a working example of how to activate a tab in either 2007 or 2010 versions of Excel. Note, for Excel 2010, MS has already incorporated the ActivateTab and ActivateTabMso methods, so one doesn't have to worry about elaborate codes to get the job done. The XML code used is given below

PHP Code:


<customUI onLoad="OLUIR" xmlns=http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/2006/01/customui>
<ribbon> 
<tabs>
<tab id="tabAUniqueNameIDForMyNewTab" label="My New Tab" insertAfterMso="TabView">
</tab>
</tabs> 
</ribbon> 
</customUI>

**philipb645** · 01-30-2012, 09:41 PM

**Excel Fox** · 02-04-2012, 12:08 PM

Phil,

Welcome to Excel Fox

You can simply call the function like so

Code:

Sub OLUIR(ribbon As IRibbonUI)

    On Error Resume Next
    If Val(Application.Version) = 14 Then
        ribbon.ActivateTabMso "TabAddIns" ' For Excel 2010
    ElseIf Val(Application.Version) = 12 Then
        Application.OnTime Now(), "ActivateMyTab" 'For Excel 2007
    End If

End Sub

Sub ActivateMyTab()

    ActivateTab "Add-Ins"
    
End Sub

**Excel Fox** · 02-04-2012, 12:10 PM

The code above is written to take care of Excel 2010 also....

However, if you were only using 2010, you wouldn't need the IF condition

Code:

Sub OLUIR(ribbon As IRibbonUI)

    On Error Resume Next
        ribbon.ActivateTab "TabAddIns" ' For Excel 2010

End Sub

**philipb645** · 02-06-2012, 06:44 PM

So do I have to call that sub? I for the live of me can't make the code work you gave me for just 2010. Don't I have to pass in a ribbon?

**Excel Fox** · 02-26-2012, 02:48 AM

Check the attachment...

**philipb645** · 02-27-2012, 08:42 PM

I've attached my sample project. It has a menu which shows on the add-ins tab. With your code, I can't seem to give focus to it. I'm sure I missing something easy.

**Rob Kemper** · 09-28-2012, 03:06 PM

Hello,

How To Activate A New Ribbon Tab.xlsm
This is the example that I tried in Excel 2007.

You asked me to start a new thread but the button to do so is not available. According to manual I do not have the rights probably. I have registered.

If you open the example it creates the custom tab but gets an error 91 because the ReturnElement has value Nothing and cannnot call its method. In my opinion this is caused because GetAccessible does not find the custom tab in the control tree.

Can you look into this example in spite of the fact that I did not create a new Thread?

Thanks

Rob Kemper