Does anyone know why MS removed the FileSearch object from Office 2007?
I’ve seen a few newsgroup postings from folks struggling to work out how they are going to migrate to 2007 because all their file code now breaks.
Fear ye not – Codematic to the rescue, we have a replacement VBA code module that is a drop in replacement for the FileSearch object. It is a commercial product so it comes with proper support and a full redistributable licence.
Its currently only 15GBP + vat which is dirt cheap (too cheap I’ve been told) considering the effort required to recode all your filesearch.execute stuff as Dir() etc.
You can buy it direct and download it immediately from here.
If you can think of any other features that have been mislaid on the journey from 2003 to 2007 then leave a comment and let us know. Don’t bother suggesting they forgot a proper UI, I’ve looked into fixing that robustly (to a level I would be prepared to support commercially) and its a ton of work.
The fileSearch replacement is imaginatively called AltFileSearch. Something tells me thats going to be a bigger brand than Google in 2009.
Or maybe not.
Cheers
Simon
Smurf on Spreadsheets 
Monday, 8th September, 2008 at 7:08 pm |
Charting comes to mind. It’s been a while since I gave up on finding a solution, but no more creating and positioning charts using code from 2003. (recording doesn’t even work).
Monday, 8th September, 2008 at 10:53 pm |
I need to read the custom doc properties of a closed file. I wasn’t aware people used FileSearch for other reasons.
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 8:43 am |
Unbelievable. It just goes to show that you never stop learning – I didn’t even know FileSearch existed in Excel. I had used the FindFirstFile and FindNextFile API’s wrapped in a class to provide this kind of functionality. We’ll at least my spreadsheets wont break when (if) they’re upgraded to MSO 2007.
This is just another reminder that you need to look at the underlying functionality of the host application before going off and reinventing the wheel.
Cheers – Marcus
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 11:48 am |
Dick –
MS has a dll called DSOFile that will give you access to built-in and custom document properties of a closed file. I never use it for anything that has to be deployed, because you need to download and install the dll, but it’s handy working on my own box.
Here’s the link:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=9BA6FAC6-520B-4A0A-878A-53EC8300C4C2
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 12:11 pm |
Jon
DSOfile is handy, I have a standalone exe version somewhere that you can use from VBA. I’ll try and dig it out.
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 1:17 pm |
I deploy the DSOFile dll because the installation of the DSOFile package creates a lot of unnecessary files.
Kind regards,
Dennis
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 2:41 pm |
As I recall when MS were thinking of droppin g FileSearch from 2007, because it is so buggy they figured fixing it wasn’t worth the effort, they asked if anyone used it. As I recall, not one person said they did … good enough for MS.
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 2:55 pm |
I saw on DDOE a comment that it didn’t work right if indexing was turned off. As this is the first performance enhancement everyone recommends thats a bit of an issue.
Bearing in mind what Bob says about MS, let all be sure and tell them how useful we find XLM. I’d better fire up some more posts to show what a vibrant dev community it still has.
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 3:27 pm |
In Office XP Research and File Searh were part of the same Custom Task Pane.
In Office 2003 they seperated it. You can go to Research from FileSearch but not the other way round
One of the bugs in the file search feature is that when searching by file name if specify the type of file as say Excel files…it does not restrict the file search to just excel files..
Simon – Does you utility create a CTP
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 3:50 pm |
Sam it has no UI its just a VBA class to replace app.filesearch
(personally I’m not a fan a screenstealers like the task pain, I prefer floating dialogs)
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 5:51 pm |
I’m considering DSOFile, but I don’t want to use it. I have enough trouble convincing IT to allow one xla file on the server. Now I have to convince them to put a dll on *every* machine. I don’t want to start that battle.
My next thought is to just open the file and read the CDP. It will be a performance hit, but no deployment issues.
Oh, and I was one of those people that said they never used FSO. After that, I checked it out and found it’s great for reading closed files. :)
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 6:14 pm |
For one application, I have templates that reference an addin (to access vba functions there). I use FileSearch to check a custom version property before opening the model because of issues with the user opening an older version of a model, which then loads an older version of the addin – and then things get a little confusing. Not sure what I am going to do when they want to move to XL07. I am deploying an DLL already, so I guess the DSOFile DLL could be added to that deployment. Thanks for the suggestion of just deploying the DLL and not the whole app.
I guess I should look at changing it so there isn’t a reference between the addin and the model – it has been a hassle in retrospect.
Very useful discussion.
–Charlie
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 6:33 pm |
@Simon:
“task pain” = Freudian slip?
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 6:50 pm |
Jayson good spot ha ha ha :-)
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 11:08 pm |
I didn’t think “task pain” was a slip at all. I assumed Simon meant exactly what he wrote.
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 11:28 pm |
let all be sure and tell them how useful we find XLM. >/quote>
No Simon, it doesn’t work like that. MS only listen to their customers when they are saying what MS want to hear. If those customers are trying to influence MS to do something the boss corp doesn’t want to, thay fall back on SQUIRM.
Wednesday, 10th September, 2008 at 12:33 am |
Jon it was a genuine Freudian slip, I was thinking what a pain in the arse they are, especially the pointless one (that would be any and all of them) that triggers on the same shortcut as the Essbase add-in. I think my subconscious got that one spot on.
Bob
Quote from a story one of my kids wrote at school today:
“I asked my dad, but he said no, so I did it anyway….”
He’s 7, has a great career ahead as a ‘listener.’
Monday, 10th December, 2012 at 7:13 am |
I would love to buy this, assuming that it will also work in Access 2010, but the “buy” link gets me a 404 error.