Range.FormulaArray causing error in specific cases

Question

I have a piece of code which puts an array formula in a range. It is throwing runtime error:1004 "Unable to set the FormulaArray property of the Range class". But when I paste the same formula in the cell and hit Ctrl+Shift+Enter everything works fine.

strFormula = "=IF(SUM(--(A2=Data!$A$2:$A$1423)*--(B2=YEAR(Data!$B$2:$B$1423))*  --(C2=MONTH(Data!$B$2:$B$1423)) * (Data!$E$2:$E$1423))=0,TEXT(,),SUM(--(A2=Data!$A$2:$A$1423)*--(B2=YEAR(Data!$B$2:$B$1423))*  --(C2=MONTH(Data!$B$2:$B$1423)) * (Data!$E$2:$E$1423)))"

shtAbsoluteData.Range("D2").FormulaArray  = strFormula

The problem occurs when the IF condition was inserted. So without the IF the following code works fine:

strFormula = "=SUM(--(A2=Data!$A$2:$A$1423)*--(B2=YEAR(Data!$B$2:$B$1423))*  --(C2=MONTH(Data!$B$2:$B$1423)) * (Data!$E$2:$E$1423))"

shtAbsoluteData.Range("D2").FormulaArray = strFormula

Note: If I use shtAbsoluteData.Range("D2").Formula then there is no error but the result is incorrect

Answer 1

A Range.FormulaArray property can only have 255 characters and yours was showing 248. A few mistypes might have brought it over the limit.

strFormula = "=IF(SUM((A2=Data!$A$2:$A$1423)*" & _
                     "(B2=YEAR(Data!$B$2:$B$1423))*" & _
                     "(C2=MONTH(Data!$B$2:$B$1423))*" & _
                     "(Data!$E$2:$E$1423))," & _
                 "SUM((A2=Data!$A$2:$A$1423)*" & _
                     "(B2=YEAR(Data!$B$2:$B$1423))*" & _
                     "(C2=MONTH(Data!$B$2:$B$1423))*" & _
                     "(Data!$E$2:$E$1423))," & _
                 "TEXT(,))"   '<~~ 226 characters
shtAbsoluteData.Range("D2").FormulaArray = strFormula

As I mentioned in comments, the double-unary operator is not necessary when multiplying boolean conditional statements against each other. The act of the mathematical operation makes the boolean ► numerical conversion.

Alternatives

In Excel Options, Advanced, Display options for this worksheet you can turn off Show a zero in cells that have zero value.

Any of the Accounting number formats will display a hyphen in place of a zero value.

A custom Number Format Code can be generated that simply does not display zeroes at all. One of the simplest would be,

General;General;;@

Answer 2

I got the same problem. What I did to solve the problem is to first declare the range object, then use .FormulaArray on the range.

Using C#:

Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel.Range eRange = wks.Range[wks.Cells[1,1], wks.Cells[20, 20]];
eRange.FormulaArray = $@"=some formula";