Get a Handle to a Running Word/Excel Instance

Look for a running Word, resp. Excel instance and return its handle. If no running instance is found a new instance will be created (which will be communicated with a warning). 

GetCurrWrd()
GetCurrXL()

Value

a handle (pointer) to the running Word, resp. Excel instance.

Note

When closing an application instance, the value of the pointer in R is not somehow automatically invalidated. In such cases the corresponding variable contains an invalid address. Whether the pointer still refers to a valid running application instance can be checked by IsValidHwnd.

Author

Andri Signorell <andri@signorell.net>

Examples

if (FALSE) # Windows-specific example

# Start a new instance
GetNewWrd()

# grab the handle to this instance
wrd <- GetCurrWrd()
#> Loading required namespace: RDCOMClient
#> Warning: RDCOMClient is unfortunately not available for Linux systems (Windows-only).

# this should be valid
IsValidHwnd(wrd)
#> [1] FALSE

# close the instance
wrd$quit()
#> Error in eval(expr, envir, enclos): attempt to apply non-function

# now it should be gone and the pointer invalid
if(IsValidHwnd(wrd)){ 
  print("Ouups! Still there?")
} else {  
  print("GetCurrWrd: no running word instance found...")
}
#> [1] "GetCurrWrd: no running word instance found..."