Grabbing the MRU List

Summary: The MRU (most recently used) list informs you which documents were the last to be opened and edited in Word. You can access the list in a macro by using the RecentFiles collection, as illustrated in this tip. (This tip works with Microsoft Word 97, Word 2000, Word 2002, Word 2003, and Word 2007.)

Word allows you to maintain a list of the most-recently used (MRU) files. This list can record the names of the most recently opened and edited within Word. You can see the MRU list by clicking the Office button (in Word 2007) or at the bottom of the File menu (in previous Word versions).

If you want to grab the names of the MRU files and insert those names in a document, you can use the following VBA macro:

Sub MostRecent()
    Dim J As Integer

    For J = 1 To RecentFiles.Count
        Selection.TypeText Text:=RecentFiles(J).Name
        Selection.TypeParagraph
    Next J
End Sub

Tip #1457 applies to Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003 | 2007

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Grabbing the MRU List