How to use PIAs for multiple Office Versions Development

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Hi friends,

Although have come to have an idea to be using the PIAs to release the limitations of versions dependencies in case of Office Developments in VSTO unfortunately when I downloaded the requisite PIAs for the versions 2003, 2007 and 2010 upon running any of the same the result is a msgbox:

"Please install Microsoft Office 20xx before installing this product."

Furthermore, haven't found any clear walkthrough tutorial to be aware of the way to use the same. In other words how to make a simple Excel Add-In for my colleagues having a variety of Office versions (2003-2013) while I have Office 2013 and Visual Studio 2013 installed on my machine?

Shall highly oblige any of you experts to reveal the most beneficial manner of doing so by either providing a way to work in this regard or recommending any valid source of info on net for the same.

Thanx in advance.

Posted 8-Dec-13 21:34pm

Faraz.Online

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Maciej Los · Accepted Answer · 2013-12-09T06:24:00

I'm afraid, you can't ;(

As far as i know, VS 2010-2013 does not supports programmers to write COM addin for MS Excel 2003. It supports creation of MS Excel addin for version 2007 and higher. See: VS2010 vs Excel 2003 add-in[^] for more details.

There are several reasons:

MS Excel 2007 and higher uses OpenXML[^] standard.
MS Excel 2007 and higher provides the part of backward compatibility,
the list of other differences you'll find here: MS Excel 2003 vs. 2007[^], for example:

different count of rows in sheet
different count of columns in sheet
MS Excel 2003 uses CommandBars, MS Excel 2007 and higher uses Ribbons
etc.

For further information, please see:
General Reference (Office Development in Visual Studio)[^]
How to: Install Office Primary Interop Assemblies[^]
Office Primary Interop Assemblies[^]
Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for Excel[^]
Excel Application-Level Add-in Development[^]

Alternatively, you can write VBA Addin[^], Creating an Excel Add-in[^]

Conclusion: You need to write 2 addins: one for MS Excel 2003 and one for MS Excel 2007 and higher (at least).