Steve Johnson
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Thermal Process Development Excel add-in

2026 · Tool

An open-source VBA add-in that turns Smartsheet exports into branded equipment lists, project schedules, and vendor quote packages.

Problem

Building a customer equipment list, a project schedule, and vendor quote packages from a Smartsheet export was a manual process that took 4+ hours and several hundred clicks.

What I built

  • An open-source VBA Excel add-in that turns Smartsheet exports into branded customer equipment lists, project schedules, and vendor quote packages.
  • Eight ribbon tools: custom and one-click versions of equipment list, schedule, and split-sheet generation, plus sheet export and a settings tool that sets the one-click defaults.
  • A settings system that saves each user's choices across Excel sessions, so the one-click tools run from saved defaults with no setup dialog.
  • A source-controlled project with a scripted headless PowerShell build, replacing an unversioned single file.
  • Business logic split out of Excel-dependent code, with 20 Rubberduck unit tests for the column-selection, numbering, and settings-fallback logic.
  • A GitHub Actions workflow that checks every change for broken ribbon callbacks and missing coding-standard declarations before merge, plus a pre-release check that the source matches what ships inside the built add-in.
  • A user guide and wiki, a developer architecture guide, a changelog, and a release process, so the add-in can be handed off and supported.
  • Built with AI coding agents (Claude Code) to speed up development, while keeping ownership of design, review, testing, and releases.

Stack

  • VBA
  • Excel
  • Smartsheet exports
  • PowerShell
  • GitHub Actions
  • Rubberduck
  • Claude Code

Outcome

  • Cut a 4+ hour, several-hundred-click manual build to 4 clicks and about 10 seconds.
  • Versioned releases driven by feedback from the project team, with every change tracked through GitHub issues and reviewed pull requests.
  • Refactored in small, reviewable changes: removed duplicated code across five dialogs, fixed silent failures, and surfaced errors to the user.
  • Published as a public open-source repository with contributor documentation.
  • It has 2 users today.