Alison Balteramp;#039;s Mastering Microsoft Office Access 1002003 [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

Using Menu Add-Ins

A

menu add-in is a general-purpose tool that enables you to perform a task that generally affects multiple objects or Access itself. The Database Splitter and Database Documenter are examples of menu add-ins. You access menu add-ins through the Add-ins submenu of the Tools menu.

Looking at Design Guidelines

Menu add-ins are available to the user whenever the Tools menu is available. Menu add-ins are not context sensitive like wizards and builders. Therefore, they should in no way rely on what the user is doing at a particular moment.

Creating a Menu Add-In

Creating a menu add-in is just like creating a wizard. The difference is in how you install the add-in. You must register the menu add-in under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE \Microsoft\Office\11.0\Access\Menu Add-Ins. You can accomplish the registration process by modifying the registry directly or by using the USysRegInfo table. Figure 25.15 shows the registry with the correct entries to run the Form Wizard, created earlier in this chapter, as an add-in. Figure 25.16 shows how you can automate the registration process by using the USysRegInfo table. I have included three entries in the USysRegInfo table. All three entries designate the proper place in the registry tree to add the new key. The first entry contains the subkey and a type of zero. The second entry contains the value name Expression and the name of the entry point function as the value. Notice that the expression name is preceded by an equal sign (=) and is followed by parentheses. Access requires the quotation marks within the parentheses because this particular entry-point function requires an argument. The third and final entry contains the value name Library and the name of the library as the value. This is all you need to do to turn a wizard into a menu add-in.