title: How to activate (make visible / enable / show) Selection Pane in PowerPoint using VBA?
body: <p>In PowerPoint 2013, the Selection pane properties are available from a CommandBar object as follows:</p>
  
  <pre><code>Application.CommandBars("Selection")
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>(note that for PowerPoint 2010 and 2007 the name is "Selection and Visibility")</p>
  
  <p>When using Alt+F10 in the UI to show the Selection Pane, the following two properties are toggled to true:</p>
  
  <pre><code>Application.CommandBars("Selection").Visible
  Application.CommandBars("Selection").Enabled
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>However, when attempting to set these to true programmatically, the .Visible=True statement causes an unspecified automation error to occur and the .Enabled=True statement executes but doesn't change the state of this property.</p>
  
  <p>But, and this is the weird part, if Alt+F10 is used to show and hide the Selection Pane when PowerPoint first runs, the two lines of code work! I checked all the properties before and after Alt+F10 and only the .Visible and .Enabled ones are toggled.</p>
  
  <p>How can I show the Selection Pane reliably and preferably without having to go down the SendKeys route?</p>