Entering VBA Code
Of course, most of the VBA code you create will not be recorded, but instead entered at the keyboard. As you type your VBA code, the Visual Basic Editor checks each line for syntax errors. A line that contains one or more errors will be displayed in red, the default color for errors. Variables usually appear in black. Other colors are also used; comments (see later) are usually green and some VBA keywords (Function, Range, etc.) usually appear in blue. (These default colors can be changed if you wish.)
If you type a long line of code, it will not automatically wrap to the next line but will simply disappear off the screen. You need to insert a line-continuation character (the underscore character, but you must type a space followed by the underscore character followed by ENTER) to cause a line break in a line of VBA code, as in the following example:
Worksheets("Sheet1").Range("A2:B7").Copy _ (Worksheets("Sheet2").Range("C2"))
The line-continuation character can't be used within a string, i.e., within quotes.
I recommend that you type the module-level declaration Option Explicit at the top of each module sheet, before any procedures. Option Explicit forces you to declare all variables using Dim statements; undeclared variables produce an error at compile time.
When you type VBA code in a module, it's good programming practice to use TAB to indent related lines for easier reading, as shown in the following procedure.
End Sub_
Figure 1-10. A simple VBA Sub procedure.
In order to produce a more compact display of a procedure, several lines of code can be combined in one line by separating them with colons. For example, the procedure in Figure 1-10 can be replaced by the more compact one in Figure 1-11 or even by the one in Figure 1-12.
Sub InitializeO
Figure 1-11. A Sub procedure with several statements combined.
Sub InitializeQ: For J = 1 To N: P(J) = 0: Next J: End Sub_
Figure 1-12. A Sub procedure in one line.
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