How to add a button to a Word document and assign its Click event at run-time

This article demonstrates how you can use a Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications macro to programmatically add a control to a Microsoft Word document and add a Click event handler for that control.

The following steps illustrate how you can create a Word macro that will add a control to a document and assign the Click event of that control at run-time. The steps are for Word. However, you can apply the same concepts to programmatically manipulate controls in Microsoft Excel workbooks.

Note The ability to manipulate the Visual Basic Project of a Microsoft Office document at run-time requires a reference to the Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications Extensibility library.

Steps to create the sample

1. Start a new document in Word.
2. Press Alt+F11 to go to the Visual Basic Editor.
3. On the Tools menu, click References.
4. Select the reference for Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications Extensibility.
5. Insert a new module, and then add the following code example.

   Sub Test()
       
       'Add a command button to a new document
       Dim doc As Word.Document
       Dim shp As Word.InlineShape
       Set doc = Documents.Add
       
       Set shp = doc.Content.InlineShapes.AddOLEControl(ClassType:="Forms.CommandButton.1")
       shp.OLEFormat.Object.Caption = "Click Here"
       
       'Add a procedure for the click event of the inlineshape
       '**Note: The click event resides in the This Document module
       Dim sCode As String
       sCode = "Private Sub " & shp.OLEFormat.Object.Name & "_Click()" & vbCrLf & _
               "   MsgBox ""You Clicked the CommandButton""" & vbCrLf & _
               "End Sub"
       doc.VBProject.VBComponents("ThisDocument").CodeModule.AddFromString sCode
           
   End Sub

6. Run the macro "Test".
7. Once the macro "Test" finishes running, you will see a new CommandButton control on a new document. When you click the CommandButton control, the Click event of the control fires.

Additional notes for Word 2002 and Word 2003

By default, access to a Word VBA project is disabled. When disabled, the code above may generate the run-time error '6068', "Programmatic Access to Visual Basic Project is not trusted." For more information about this error and how you can correct it, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: