Project goals for Text Tools
The first step in designing a utility is to envision exactly how you want the utility to work. Here's my original plan, stated in the form of ten goals:
♦ Its main features will be those listed at the beginning of this section.
♦ It will enable the user to request the preceding types of changes to nontext cells as well as to text cells.
♦ It will have the same look and feel of other Excel commands. In other words, it will have a dialog box that looks like Excel's dialog boxes.
♦ It will be in the form of an add-in and will also be accessible from the Tools menu.
♦ It will operate with the current selection of cells (including multiple selections), and it will enable the user to modify the range selection while the dialog box is displayed.
♦ It will remember the last operation used and display those settings the next time that the dialog box is invoked.
♦ It will have no effect on cells that contain formulas.
♦ It will be fast and efficient. For example, if the user selects an entire column, the utility should ignore the empty cells in the column.
♦ It will enable the user to undo the changes.
♦ Comprehensive help will be available.
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