Walkthrough: Creating Shortcut Menus for Bookmarks
This walkthrough demonstrates how to create shortcut menus for Bookmark controls in a document-level customization for Word. When a user right-clicks the text in a bookmark, a shortcut menu appears and gives the user options for formatting the text.
Applies to: The information in this topic applies to document-level projects for Word 2013 and Word 2010. For more information, see Features Available by Office Application and Project Type.
This walkthrough illustrates the following tasks:
Creating a Word document project in Visual Studio.
Adding text and bookmarks to the document in a document-level project at design time.
Creating a shortcut menu.
Checking for overlapping bookmarks.
Note
Your computer might show different names or locations for some of the Visual Studio user interface elements in the following instructions. The Visual Studio edition that you have and the settings that you use determine these elements. For more information, see Customizing Development Settings in Visual Studio.
Prerequisites
You need the following components to complete this walkthrough:
An edition of Visual Studio 2013 that includes the Microsoft Office developer tools. For more information, see Configuring a Computer to Develop Office Solutions.
Word 2013 or Word 2010
Creating the Project
The first step is to create a Word document project in Visual Studio.
To create a new project
Create a Word document project that has the name My Bookmark Shortcut Menu. In the wizard, select Create a new document. For more information, see How to: Create Office Projects in Visual Studio.
Visual Studio opens the new Word document in the designer and adds the My Bookmark Shortcut Menu project to Solution Explorer.
Adding Text and Bookmarks to the Document
Add some text to your document and then add two overlapping bookmarks.
To add text to your document
In the document that appears in the designer of your project, type the following text.
This is an example of creating a shortcut menu when you right-click the text in a bookmark.
To add a Bookmark control to your document
In the Toolbox, from the Word Controls tab, drag a Bookmark control to your document.
The Add Bookmark Control dialog box appears.
Select the words “creating a shortcut menu when you right-click the text”, and then click OK.
bookmark1 is added to the document.
Add another Bookmark control to the words “right-click the text in a bookmark”.
bookmark2 is added to the document.
Note
The words “right-click the text” are in both bookmark1 and bookmark2.
When you add a bookmark to a document at design time, a Bookmark control is created. You can program against several events of the bookmark. You can write code in the BeforeRightClick event of the bookmark so that when the user right-clicks the text in the bookmark, a shortcut menu appears.
Adding Commands to a Shortcut Menu
Add buttons to the shortcut menu that appears when you right-click the document.
To add commands to a shortcut menu
Add a Ribbon XML item to the project. For more information, see How to: Get Started Customizing the Ribbon.
In Solution Explorer, select ThisDocument.cs or ThisDocument.vb.
On the menu bar, choose View, Code.
The ThisDocument class file opens in the Code Editor.
Add the following code to the ThisDocument class. This code overrides the CreateRibbonExtensibilityObject method and returns the Ribbon XML class to the Office application.
Protected Overrides Function CreateRibbonExtensibilityObject() As Microsoft.Office.Core.IRibbonExtensibility Return New Ribbon1() End Function
protected override Microsoft.Office.Core.IRibbonExtensibility CreateRibbonExtensibilityObject() { return new Ribbon1(); }
In Solution Explorer, select the Ribbon XML file. By default, the Ribbon XML file is named Ribbon1.xml.
On the menu bar, choose View, Code.
The Ribbon xml file opens in the Code Editor.
In the Code Editor, replace the contents of the Ribbon XML file with the following code.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <customUI xmlns="https://schemas.microsoft.com/office/2009/07/customui" onLoad="Ribbon_Load"> <contextMenus> <contextMenu idMso="ContextMenuText"> <button id="BoldButton" label="Bold" onAction="ButtonClick" getVisible="GetVisible" /> <button id="ItalicButton" label="Italic" onAction="ButtonClick" getVisible="GetVisible"/> </contextMenu> </contextMenus> </customUI>
This code adds two buttons to the shortcut menu that appears when you right-click the document.
In Solution Explorer, right-click ThisDocument, and then click View Code.
Declare the following variables and a bookmark variable at the class level.
Public selectedBookmark As Microsoft.Office.Tools.Word.Bookmark Public ShowBoldButton As String = False Public ShowItalicButton As String = False Public WordTrue As Integer = -1 Public WordFalse As Integer = 0
public Microsoft.Office.Tools.Word.Bookmark selectedBookmark; public bool showBoldButton = false; public bool showItalicButton = false; public int WordTrue = -1; public int WordFalse = 0;
In Solution Explorer, select the Ribbon code file. By default, the Ribbon code file is named Ribbon1.cs or Ribbon1.vb.
On the menu bar, choose View, Code.
The Ribbon code file opens in the Code Editor.
In the Ribbon code file, add the following method. This is a callback method for the two buttons that you have added to the shortcut menu of the document. This method determines whether these buttons appear in the shortcut menu. The bold and italic buttons appear only if you right-click text within the bookmark.
Public Function GetVisible(ByVal control As Office.IRibbonControl) As Boolean If control.Id = "BoldButton" Then If Globals.ThisDocument.ShowBoldButton = True Then Globals.ThisDocument.ShowBoldButton = False Return True Else Return False End If ElseIf control.Id = "ItalicButton" Then If Globals.ThisDocument.ShowItalicButton = True Then Globals.ThisDocument.ShowItalicButton = False Return True Else Return False End If Else Return False End If End Function
public bool GetVisible(Office.IRibbonControl control) { if (control.Id == "BoldButton") { if (Globals.ThisDocument.showBoldButton == true) { Globals.ThisDocument.showBoldButton = false; return true; } else { return false; } } else if (control.Id == "ItalicButton") { if (Globals.ThisDocument.showItalicButton == true) { Globals.ThisDocument.showItalicButton = false; return true; } else { return false; } } else { return false; } }
Format the Text in the Bookmark
To format the text in the bookmark
In the Ribbon code file, add a ButtonClick event handler to apply formatting to the bookmark.
Public Sub ButtonClick(ByVal control As Office.IRibbonControl) If control.Id = "BoldButton" Then If Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Bold = _ Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue Then Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Bold = _ Globals.ThisDocument.WordFalse Else Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Bold = _ Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue End If ElseIf control.Id = "ItalicButton" Then If Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Italic = _ Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue Then Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Italic = _ Globals.ThisDocument.WordFalse Else Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Italic = _ Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue End If End If End Sub
public void ButtonClick(Office.IRibbonControl control) { if (control.Id == "BoldButton") { if (Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Bold == Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue) { Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Bold = Globals.ThisDocument.WordFalse; } else { Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Bold = Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue; } } else if (control.Id == "ItalicButton") { if (Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Italic == Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue) { Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Italic = Globals.ThisDocument.WordFalse; } else { Globals.ThisDocument.selectedBookmark.Italic = Globals.ThisDocument.WordTrue; } } }
Solution Explorer, select ThisDocument.cs or ThisDocument.vb.
On the menu bar, choose View, Code.
The ThisDocument class file opens in the Code Editor.
Add the following code to the ThisDocument class.
Private Sub Bookmark_BeforeRightClick(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e _ As Microsoft.Office.Tools.Word.ClickEventArgs) _ Handles Bookmark1.BeforeRightClick, Bookmark2.BeforeRightClick Dim startPosition As Integer = 0 Dim i As Integer ' If bookmarks overlap, get bookmark closest to cursor. For i = 1 To e.Selection.Bookmarks.Count If e.Selection.Bookmarks(i).Start > startPosition Then startPosition = e.Selection.Bookmarks(i).Start End If Next ' If closest bookmark is the sender, show the shortcut menu options. If DirectCast(sender, Microsoft.Office.Tools.Word.Bookmark).Start = _ startPosition Then selectedBookmark = DirectCast(sender, Microsoft.Office.Tools.Word.Bookmark) ShowBoldButton = True ShowItalicButton = True End If End Sub
void bookmark_BeforeRightClick(object sender, ClickEventArgs e) { int startPosition = 0; // If bookmarks overlap, get bookmark closest to cursor. for (int i = 1; i <= e.Selection.Bookmarks.Count; i++) { if (e.Selection.Bookmarks[i].Start > startPosition) { startPosition = e.Selection.Bookmarks[i].Start; } } // If closest bookmark is the sender, show shortcut menu options. if (((Microsoft.Office.Tools.Word.Bookmark)sender).Start == startPosition) { selectedBookmark = (Microsoft.Office.Tools.Word.Bookmark)sender; showBoldButton = true; showItalicButton = true; } }
Note
You must write code to handle the case where bookmarks overlap. If you do not, by default, the code will be called for all bookmarks in the selection.
In C#, you must add event handlers for the bookmark controls to the Startup event. For information about creating event handlers, see How to: Create Event Handlers in Office Projects.
private void ThisDocument_Startup(object sender, System.EventArgs e) { this.bookmark1.BeforeRightClick += new ClickEventHandler(bookmark_BeforeRightClick); this.bookmark2.BeforeRightClick += new ClickEventHandler(bookmark_BeforeRightClick); }
Testing the Application
Test your document to verify that the bold and italic menu items appear in the shortcut menu when you right-click text in a bookmark and that the text is properly formatted.
To test your document
Press F5 to run your project.
Right-click in the first bookmark, and then click Bold.
Verify that all of the text in bookmark1 is formatted as bold.
Right-click the text where the bookmarks overlap, and then click Italic.
Verify that all of the text in bookmark2 is italic, and only the part of the text in bookmark1 that overlaps bookmark2 is italic.
Next Steps
Here are some tasks that might come next:
Write code to respond to events of host controls in Excel. For more information, see Walkthrough: Programming Against Events of a NamedRange Control.
Use a check box to change formatting in a bookmark. For more information, see Walkthrough: Changing Document Formatting Using CheckBox Controls.
See Also
Concepts
Automating Word by Using Extended Objects
Optional Parameters in Office Solutions