Sinking events of a remote workbook

[Jaafar Tribak]

Hi all,

I am not experienced with network programming so I am asking here if the following prank would work (this is just an illustrative example)

Ok- Let's say a remote workbook (located in a network shared Drive/Folder) is currently opened by some user on the network and I wanted to play a prank on them by undoing their worksheet data input as follows :

Code in my workbook module: (Obviously, C:\RemoteWb.xls would need to be modified to the server path)

Private WithEvents Xlapp As Application

Sub HookRemoteWorkbook()
    Set Xlapp = GetObject("C:\RemoteWb.xls").Application [COLOR=#008000]'change to server pathname[/COLOR]
End Sub

Private Sub Xlapp_SheetChange(ByVal Sh As Object, ByVal Target As Range)
    With Sh.Application
        .EnableEvents = False
        .Undo
        Target = "Go to hell !!"
        .EnableEvents = True
    End With
End Sub

I tried the above code on a second excel instance on my computer and it worked as expected but would this also work if the shared network workbook was opened remotely by someone on the network ?

Another question: Is there a way of knowing if a workbook or application is currently being referenced by another program ?

Regards

 

[RoryA]

No that wouldn't work - it would just attempt to open the file on your computer and connect to that application instance. Unfortunately, although CreateObject allows you to specify a server name, GetObject doesn't, so you can't hook into an instance running on another machine that way.

 

[Jaafar Tribak]

Thanks for the info Rory

So maybe the way to go is to use CreateObject to open an invisible xl application instance on the remote computer , have this newly created instance open the hooking workbook and run the hooking code from its open event

Edit : Any thoughts on my second question ?

 

[RoryA]

That could work, in theory.

Re #2, I'm afraid I don't know. Nothing I'm aware of.

 

[Jaafar Tribak]

Ok thank you .. If I anything interesting comes up, I'll post back