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Developing Office Solutions

After you design a project by using the Office developer tools in Visual Studio and set up the project files, you can begin to concentrate on implementing the code and custom user interface (UI).

Applies to: The information in this topic applies to document-level projects and application-level projects for Microsoft Office 2013 and Microsoft Office 2010. For more information, see Features Available by Office Application and Project Type.

Office Solutions Programming Model

The Office object model exposes a variety of objects that you can program against. Whenever you program Office solutions by using managed code, you write code that uses types in the Office primary interop assemblies. In solutions you create by using the Office project templates in Visual Studio, you also write code directly against generated classes in your project. For more information, see Writing Code in Office Solutions.

Programming Different Types of Office Solutions

The type of solution that you are creating determines which features you can use in your project. For example, you can add Windows Forms controls and extended Office controls (named host controls) to document-level customizations by dragging items from the Toolbox in Visual Studio at design time. However, if you are developing an application-level add-in, you can only add these sorts of controls to documents at run time, by writing code.

For more information about features that are specific to different types of solutions, see the following topics:

For background information to help you plan your Office solutions and procedures to help you create projects, see Designing and Creating Office Solutions.

Title

Description

Writing Code in Office Solutions

Describes different aspects of writing code in Office solutions.

Programming Application-Level Add-Ins

Provides an overview of the programming model of application-level add-ins and related programming tasks.

Programming Document-Level Customizations

Provides an overview of the programming model of document-level customizations and related programming tasks.

Office UI Customization

Describes the different ways that you can customize the UI of Office applications by using application-level add-ins and document-level customizations.

Data in Office Solutions

Describes the different ways that you can work with data in Office solutions, such as binding data to controls and caching data in document-level customizations.

Troubleshooting Office Solutions

Provides tips for solving common problems that you might encounter when creating Office solutions.

Threading Support in Office

Provides an overview of working with multiple threads in Office solutions.

Accessibility in Office Projects

Describes the accessibility features that are available in Office solutions.

See Also

Tasks

How to: Create and Modify Custom Document Properties

How to: Read from and Write to Document Properties

How to: Target the Office Multilingual User Interface

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for Excel

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Document-Level Customization for Excel

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for Outlook

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for PowerPoint

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for Project

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for Word

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Document-Level Customization For Word