Win Explorer to Excel

  • Thread starter Thread starter Trent Argante
  • Start date Start date
T

Trent Argante

(Windows NT & Excel 97)
Does anyone know of a way to return the current directory
being viewed by Windows Explorer to Excel?
Thanks.
Trent
 
One way:
You could launch a script program like AutoIt which has a command that will
return the active window. You would then have Autoit save this information
in a text file and have Excel open, read, and close the text file.
http://www.hiddensoft.com/AutoIt/

Shockley
 
Shockley,
This is truly a great suggestion, which I will definitely
consider for home.
But, I don't want to go through the Admin red tape of
having it installed on my system at work.
Thanks for the help.
Trent
 
Trent, glad you liked the idea--you must have a little Rube Goldberg in you
<g>.

Regards,
Shockley
 
shockley, very astute of you. I have not heard of this Goldberg fellow,
so I read his bio on the net.

His observation is the same in nature as my long running concept of
"Harder, Sooner Vs. Easier, Faster". For example, my boss will give me a
task, I'll suggest writing a procedure that will take 4 hours, but will
minimize the actual task-time to under five minutes; but he wants it in
an hour. So, I work harder to get it done sooner instead of writing the
routine (easier) which will result in regular efficiency (faster) in the
future. Thus we tend to expend great amounts of effort to achive the
simplest of results.

It's also the same principle as expending the lesser cost up-front to
meet the immediate need instead of expending a greater cost up-front to
regularly meet the need, which will result in a lesser cost in the long
run.

It's all based on impatience - we want it NOW!

Sorry for the mini-lecture. I love talking about this stuff (if you
couldn't tell). <grin>
Nice conversing with you, shockley.
Trent Argante
 
Rube Goldberg is more about doing things in absurdly complicated fashion,
rather than making the most efficient machine--which is how I feel about
some of my vba+Autoit creations, but at the point I'm doing them it's the
only way I know. But your point is well taken, seeing as a lot of software
is entirely about automating task drudgery--and I often ask myself why
didn't I do it right the first time?? when I notice how much manual labor I
could have been avoiding.

Regards,
Shockley
 
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