The online documentation of VB/VBA language components seems to follow the 80/20 rule: the basic facts that you need to use a language statement are provided in the documentation. But the additional 20 percent that you need to use it effectively or to apply it to special cases is conspicuously absent. To a professional VB/VBA programmer, though, this missing 20 percent of the language's documentation isn't a luxury, it's a necessity. And in VB & VBA in a Nutshell: The Language, it finally is available. The bulk of the book consists of an alphabetical reference to the statements, procedures, and functions of the VB/VBA language. Each entry has a standardized listing containing the following information:

* Its syntax, using standard code conventions
* Differences in the operation of the keyword in a macro environment (e.g., in Office) and in Visual Basic, if there are any
* A list of arguments accepted by the function or procedure, if any
* A description of the data type returned by a function
* The finer points of a keyword's usage that are often omitted from or blurred over by the documentation
* Tips and gotchas that include undocumented behaviors and practical applications for particular language elements — a section particularly invaluable for diagnosing or avoiding potential programming problems
* A brief, nonobvious example that illustrates the use of the keyword