I am having trouble finding out how to get excel VBA to interact with a specific IE Window that is already open.
Here my process:
I open IE, navigate to the website, enter my username and pw, click log in. A new IE window opens that I use to enter member numbers and search for membership info.
I am trying to create a VBA script that will interact with the IE window that opens after I successfully log in (to begin to automate some of the more mundane tasks). I have seen tons of tutorials online about how to have VBA open a new IE window, and then interact with it. However, I am really struggling to find info about how to select a specific already open IE window and interact with it.
I have tried this as a quick test to see if I could select the correct IE window as an object that I can interact with.
Sub getIE()
Dim sh As Object, oWin As Object, IE As Object
Set sh = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
For Each oWin In sh.Windows
If TypeName(oWin.document) = "HTMLDocument" Then
Set IE = oWin
Exit For
End If
Next
MsgBox IE.document.URL
End Sub
The message box appears and shows the URL for initial IE window, but I don't know how to get it to select the IE window that I typically use to actually get member info.
I took several technical classes years ago when I was in school, but has been a while since I have flexed any tech muscles. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Here's what I use. It counts the number of open instances of IE and then steps through each instance and determines the url and title of the web page. You can then compare the title or url against the title or url you are looking for. The following example compares titles using the "Like" function, but like I said you could compare urls if you like. Also, if you are looking for a title or url that doesn't change you can use "=" instead of "Like".
marker = 0
Set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
IE_count = objShell.Windows.Count
For x = 0 To (IE_count - 1)
On Error Resume Next ' sometimes more web pages are counted than are open
my_url = objShell.Windows(x).Document.Location
my_title = objShell.Windows(x).Document.Title
If my_title Like "XYZ" & "*" Then 'compare to find if the desired web page is already open
Set ie = objShell.Windows(x)
marker = 1
Exit For
Else
End If
Next
If marker = 0 then
msgbox("A matching webpage was NOT found")
Else
msgbox("A matching webpage was found")
End If
The above code worked well for me. I turned it into a function call as follows
Set ieFindUser = FindIEObject("Find and List Users") 'Find handle for popup window.
The Function
Public Function FindIEObject(target As String) As InternetExplorerMedium
Set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
IE_count = objShell.Windows.Count
For x = 0 To (IE_count - 1)
On Error Resume Next ' sometimes more web pages are counted than are open
my_url = objShell.Windows(x).Document.Location
my_title = objShell.Windows(x).Document.Title
If my_title = target Then 'compare to find if the desired web page is already open
Set FindIEObject = objShell.Windows(x)
Exit For
End If
Next
End Function