Type Statement
This page is specific to the Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) Language Reference for Office 2010.
Used at module level to define a user-defined data type containing one or more elements.
Syntax
[Private | Public] Type varname
elementname [([subscripts])] As type
[elementname [([subscripts])] As type]
. . .
End Type
The Type statement syntax has these parts:
Part |
Description |
|---|---|
Public |
Optional. Used to declare user-defined types that are available to all procedures in all modules in all projects. |
Private |
Optional. Used to declare user-defined types that are available only within the module where the declaration is made. |
varname |
Required. Name of the user-defined type; follows standard variable naming conventions. |
elementname |
Required. Name of an element of the user-defined type. Element names also follow standard variable naming conventions, except that keywords can be used. |
subscripts |
When not explicitly stated in lower, the lower bound of an array is controlled by the Option Base statement. The lower bound is zero if no Option Base statement is present. |
type |
Required. Data type of the element; may be Byte, Boolean, Integer, Long, Currency, Single, Double, Decimal (not currently supported), Date, String (for variable-length strings), String * length (for fixed-length strings), Object, Variant, another user-defined type, or an object type. |
Remarks
The Type statement can be used only at module level. Once you have declared a user-defined type using the Type statement, you can declare a variable of that type anywhere within the scope of the declaration. Use Dim, Private, Public, ReDim, or Static to declare a variable of a user-defined type.
In standard modules and class modules, user-defined types are public by default. This visibility can be changed using the Private keyword.
Line numbers and line labels aren't allowed in Type...End Type blocks.
User-defined types are often used with data records, which frequently consist of a number of related elements of different data types.
The following example shows the use of fixed-size arrays in a user-defined type:
Type StateData
CityCode (1 To 100) As Integer ' Declare a static array.
County As String * 30
End Type
Dim Washington(1 To 100) As StateData
In the preceding example, StateData includes the CityCode static array, and the record Washington has the same structure as StateData.
When you declare a fixed-size array within a user-defined type, its dimensions must be declared with numeric literals or constants rather than variables.
Example
This example uses the Type statement to define a user-defined data type. The Type statement is used at the module level only. If it appears in a class module, a Type statement must be preceded by the keyword Private.
Type EmployeeRecord ' Create user-defined type.
ID As Integer ' Define elements of data type.
Name As String * 20
Address As String * 30
Phone As Long
HireDate As Date
End Type
Sub CreateRecord()
Dim MyRecord As EmployeeRecord ' Declare variable.
' Assignment to EmployeeRecord variable must occur in a procedure.
MyRecord.ID = 12003 ' Assign a value to an element.
End Sub