ID: Q151332
The information in this article applies to:
Application.Interactive does not reset itself to a default value after the end of the macro is reached.
The Interactive property of the Application object allows a macro to block all user input from both the keyboard and the mouse. The property is useful in situations where user input has the potential to disrupt macro operations. However, unlike most of the Read/Write properties of the Microsoft Excel Application object, Application.Interactive does not reset itself to a default value after the end of the macro is reached. Because of this, if the interactive property is not reset back to a true value in the code of the macro, or an error occurs during execution of the macro, Microsoft Excel will not respond to user input even though the macro has technically stopped executing.
If you forget to reset the property back to true, or encounter an error in the execution of the code, you will likely need to shut down that instance of Microsoft Excel and fix the line of code that caused the error.
To do this, press CTRL+ALT+DELETE in Windows 95/98 or Windows NT and end the Microsoft Excel task.
On the Apple Macintosh, press OPTION+COMMAND+ESCAPE to force Microsoft Excel to quit.
Under Windows 3.x you may be able to press CTRL+ALT+DELETE, but more often than not, because no "error" has occurred, you will have to restart the machine.
Microsoft provides programming examples for illustration only, without warranty either expressed or implied, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability and/or fitness for a particular purpose. This article assumes that you are familiar with the programming language being demonstrated and the tools used to create and debug procedures. Microsoft Support professionals can help explain the functionality of a particular procedure, but they will not modify these examples to provide added functionality or construct procedures to meet your specific needs. If you have limited programming experience, you may want to contact the Microsoft fee-based consulting line at (800) 936-5200. For more information about the support options available from Microsoft, please see the following page on the World Wide Web:
http://www.microsoft.com/support/supportnet/refguide/
NOTE: The success of the following macro depends on the ability to open a separate instance of Microsoft Excel. Under Windows 3.x, the number and complexity of programs that can be running concurrently is directly dependent on available system resources. If the instance of Microsoft Excel that is not responding, or the instance you are trying to open contains many worksheets, charts and so on, system resources will be significantly reduced. In Microsoft Excel 98, you cannot start a separate instance of Microsoft Excel, and therefore must run the macro from another program.
The method for opening a separate instance of Microsoft Excel varies depending on the operating system.
1. Press ALT+TAB to switch to Program Manager.
2. Either double-click the Microsoft Excel icon or click Run on the
File menu. Type the complete path to the Microsoft Excel executable
file, for example, "c:\Excel\Excel.exe", and then press ENTER.
1. Click Start, and then click Run
2. Type the full path to Microsoft Excel in the Open box, for
example, "c:\Excel\Excel.exe", and then press ENTER.
Visual Basic Editor.
1. Switch to Finder.
NOTE: If you have Microsoft Office Manager installed from Microsoft
Office and you have QuickSwitch enabled for the Microsoft Office
Manager, you can press COMMAND+TAB to switch to Finder. Otherwise, you
have to click the Finder desktop or another program window in the
background to switch to that program.
3. Create a copy of the Microsoft Excel icon by holding down OPTION
button and dragging the icon to the desktop.
After starting a separate instance of Microsoft Excel using one of the methods listed earlier, follow these steps:
1. On the Insert menu, click Module.
2. Type the following code in the Module sheet.
Sub reset_interactive()
Dim xlobj As Object
' The GetObject method will access the open instance of Microsoft
' Excel, not a new one.
Set xlobj = GetObject("Book1")
' Where book1 is the name of the Workbook that has stopped
' responding to user input. Make sure to leave the extension,
' .xls, .xlt, and so on, off.
' Because the above line assigns the first Worksheet of book1 to
' xlobj, we must access the Application property of the object in
' order to reset the Interactive property.
xlobj.Application.Interactive = True
End Sub
press F5.
As stated previously, you cannot start more than one instance of Microsoft Excel 98; therefore, you must run the Visual Basic for Applications Sub procedure from another Microsoft Office program. In this example, we will use Microsoft Word 98.
1. Switch to Microsoft Word 98.
NOTE: If you have Microsoft Office Manager installed from Microsoft
Office and you have QuickSwitch enabled for the Microsoft Office
Manager, you can press COMMAND+TAB to switch to Finder. Otherwise, you
would have to click the Finder desktop or another program window
in the background to switch to that program.
3. On the Insert menu, click Module.
4. Type the following code in the Module sheet:
Sub reset_interactive()
Dim xlobj As Object
' The GetObject method will access the open instance of Microsoft
' Excel.
Set xlobj = GetObject(,"Excel.Application")
' Sets the Interactive property for the Excel application back to
' True.
xlobj.Interactive = True
End Sub
press F5.
Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in the Microsoft products listed at the beginning of this article.
REFERENCES
For more information about the Interactive property in Microsoft Excel 97, from the Visual Basic Editor, click the Office Assistant, type "interactive," click Search, and then click to view "Interactive Property."
NOTE: If the Assistant is hidden, click the Office Assistant button on the Standard toolbar. If the Assistant is not able to answer your query, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
ARTICLE-ID: Q176476
TITLE : OFF: Office Assistant Not Answering Visual Basic Questions
"Microsoft Excel/Visual Basic Reference", second edition, page 394
Additional query words: 5.00 5.00a 5.00c 7.00
Keywords : kbole kbprg kbdta kbdtacode PgmOthr KbVBA
Version : MACINTOSH:5.00,98; WINDOWS:5.0,5.0c,7.0,97
Platform : MACINTOSH WINDOWS
Issue type : kbprbLast Reviewed: May 17, 1999