Writing Add-in for Microsoft Excel 2010 using Visual Studio 2010

Using Visual Studio 2010 Professional, creating Excel Add-in is pretty simple. Following are the steps I followed for writing an Add-In for exporting Xml:

Step # 1

Create new project of type ‘Excel 2010 Add-in’. The project will have a class file called ThisAddin.cs.

Step # 2

For creating a button on the Excel ribbon, right click on the project and select Add – > New Item.

Step # 3

Select ‘Ribbon (XML)’ from the list of new items and name the ribbon class, say Ribbon1. This will add two files to the project which are Ribbon1.cs and Ribbon1.xml.

Step # 4

Add the following code in ThisAddin class

protected override Microsoft.Office.Core.IRibbonExtensibility CreateRibbonExtensibilityObject()
{
    return new Ribbon1();
}

Step # 5

In Ribbon1.xml define the properties of the button that will be displayed on the Excel ribbon. The onAction attribute specifies the method which will be called from Ribbon1.cs on clicking the button (onAction="OnTextButton").

 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
	<customUI xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/2009/07/customui" onLoad="Ribbon_Load">
	  <ribbon>
	    <tabs>
	      <tab idMso="TabAddIns">
	        <group id="MyGroup"
	               label="Export XML">
	          <button id="textButton" label="Generate XML"
	             screentip="Export to XML" onAction="OnTextButton"
	             supertip="Export excel sheet to XML file."/>
	        </group>
	      </tab>
	    </tabs>
	  </ribbon>
	</customUI>

Step # 6

Add following method declaration to Ribbon1.cs and implement your functionality here.

public void OnTextButton(Office.IRibbonControl control)
{
    //TODO:Add your implementation here
} 

Links:

• Writing a simple Excel Add-In for exporting data to Xml
• Working with Excel Workbooks (MSDN)
• How to: Store and Retrieve Date Values in Excel Ranges (MSDN)
• Walkthrough: Creating a Custom Tab by Using Ribbon XML (MSDN)