Find un-open workbook and print from specified sheet - excel

Question

I am creating a spreadsheet which links my customers to their regular orders.
For example: John Smith has eight different orders. So I have one workbook for John Smith and eight sheets within the workbook (one for each order). It needs to be like this because the orders are lengthy and require simple editing.
The spreadsheet in construction has a drop down list for the customers (B3), a drop down list for orders (F3) and a print button (Button10). Therefore you select a customer, select an order and hit print. I want this to then go to the directory (C:\Users\Julian\Documents\Customers), find the correct workbook and sheet, then go to print preview mode of the correct order.
I have very average VBA knowledge (I know how to make a button print preview the current worksheet, but that’s about it). I already have a cell which automatically shows the workbook name (T6) in the right format and automatically shows the worksheet name (T7) in the right format based on drop down selections.
I was wondering if someone could help me with some code to print the correct sheet from the correct workbook based on the drop down selections. If it can’t find the workbook or sheet, I wanted a pop-up message that says “There is no workbook or sheet under this search criteria” or something along those lines instead of a generic coding error.
Any help would be appreciated! Thank you!
Julian.

Answer 1

This is my first answer on Stack Overflow so please bear with me.
I work with databases for a living and I believe there is always a way to make things simpler, especially when you're using Excel, and even more so when you're open to using VBA. I suggest you upload a sample John Smith file and I can show you how to set up a more efficient way for what you're trying to do.
If you just need a quick answer, try the following suggestions.
Error Trapping When Workbook Does Not Exist
'Open the VBA Editor (Alt+F11) and create a new Module and paste the following code in:
Sub PrintOrder()
Application.ScreenUpdating = False
Application.DisplayAlerts = False
'-----------'
' VARIABLES '
'-----------'
Dim wb As Workbook, _
ws As Worksheet, _
wb_Client As Workbook, _
ws_Order As Worksheet, _
blOrder As Boolean, _
filDir As String, _
client As String, _
order As String, _
sht As Worksheet, _
xtsn As String
Set wb = ThisWorkbook
Set ws = wb.Worksheets("Sheet1")
'Insert your actual sheet name in place of "Sheet1" or use the worksheet number such as wb.Worksheets(1)
filDir = "C:\Users\Julian\Documents\Customers\"
ChDrive "C"
ChDir filDir
client = Trim(LTrim(ws.Range("T6").Value))
order = Trim(LTrim(ws.Range("T7").Value))
xtsn = ".xlsx" 'Replace the extension below with whatever format your file is in or simply use xtsn = "" if you've already included the file extension in the T6 cell
'---------------------------------'
' CHECK IF CLIENT WORKBOOK EXISTS '
'---------------------------------'
If Dir(client & xtsn) <> "" Then 'the workbook exists so open it
Workbooks.Open Filename:=filDir & client & xtsn
Set wb_Client = ActiveWorkbook
'---------------------------------'
' CHECK IS ORDER WORKSHEET EXISTS '
'---------------------------------'
blOrder = False
For Each sht In Worksheets
If sht.Name = order Then
blOrder = True
Exit For
End If
Next
If blOrder Then 'worksheet exists so open its print preview window
'EDIT// I originally set ws_Order to wb.Worksheets(order) but the proper workbook should be the customer workbook that just opened
Set ws_Order = wb_Client.Worksheets(order)
ws_Order.PrintPreview
Else 'worksheet does not exist so throw into error
'//EDIT// I forgot the ampersand before the 'customer' string variable, which ruined the concatenation
Call MsgBox(prompt:="Order No. " & order & " has not been created for " & customer & "." & _
Chr(13) & "Please create a new order worksheet before continuing." & _
Chr(13) & Chr(13) & " Error Code: A002", _
Buttons:=vbOkOnly, Title:="ERROR: Missing Order Worksheet")
GoTo endProc
End If
Else 'workbook does not exist so throw into error
Call MsgBox(prompt:="No client workbook was found for " & customer & "." & _
Chr(13) & "Please create a new client workbook before continuing." & _
Chr(13) & Chr(13) & " Error Code: A001", _
Buttons:=vbOkOnly, Title:="ERROR: Missing Client Workbook")
GoTo endProc
End If
endProc:
Application.ScreenUpdating = True
Application.DisplayAlerts = True
End Sub