WD97: Using the Open Statement in Word VBA (181788)

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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 a Microsoft Certified Partner or the Microsoft fee-based consulting line at (800) 936-5200. For more information about Microsoft Certified Partners, please visit the following Microsoft Web site: For more information about the support options that are available and about how to contact Microsoft, visit the following Microsoft Web site: The correct syntax for the Open statement is:

   Open pathname For mode [access] [lock] As [#]filenumber [Len=reclength]
				

The Open statement syntax has the following parts.

Part            Description
---------------------------

pathname        Required. String expression that specifies a file name may
                include directory or folder, and drive.

    mode        Required. Keyword specifying the file mode: Append, Binary,
                Input, Output, or Random. If unspecified, the file is
                opened for Random access.

  access        Optional. Keyword specifying the operations permitted on
                the open file: Read, Write, or Read Write.

    lock        Optional. Keyword specifying the operations permitted on
                the open file by other processes: Shared, Lock Read, Lock
                Write, and Lock Read Write.

filenumber      Required. A valid file number in the range 1 to 511,
                inclusive. Use the FreeFile function to obtain the next
                available file number.

reclength       Optional. Number less than or equal to 32,767 (bytes). For
                files opened for random access, this value is the record
                length. For sequential files, this value is the number of
                characters buffered.
				

Statement Example

   Sub OpenExample()

      Dim sFirst, sLast, sAddress, sCity, sState, sZip As String

      ' CREATE DATA FILE
      ' Open file for input.
      Open "Datafile.txt" For Output As #1

      ' Write data to file.
      Write #1, "John", "Doe", "An Address", "A City", "A State", "A Zip"

      ' Close File.
      Close #1

      ' RETRIEVE DATA FROM FILE
      ' Open file for input.
      Open "Datafile.txt" For Input As #1

      ' Loop until the end of file is reached.
      Do While Not EOF(1)

         ' Read data into variables.
         Input #1, sFirst,sLast,sAddress,sCity,sState,sZip

         ' Print data to Debug window.
         Debug.Print sFirst,sLast,sAddress,sCity,sState,sZip

      Loop

      ' Close file.
      Close #1

   End Sub
				

This macro creates or opens a file called Datafile.txt and puts the comma and quotation mark delimited data into the file. The data can then later be retrieved using the Input # Statement.