Related
I would like to delete the zeros on the right side of the cells if there are more then 3 zeros.
Example:
A B
12345 12345
1230 1230
12345600 12345600
12000 12000
12340000000000000 1234000
1234500000000000000000 12345000
Is it possible to excel using just formula in the cells of the column B??
How to do?
Thanks so much!
The answers, given until now, are treating the numbers as strings, while I'd go for the numeric approach:
if mod(number,10000) = 0
then number = number div 1000;
return number;
Which means: if the number, divided by 10,000 equals 0 (if the number ends with '0000') then return the number, divided by a thousand (remove the last three zeroes).
You don't need this one time, but you need to remove all triplets of three zeroes, as much as possible, so instead of a simple if-loop, you might go for a while-loop:
while mod(number,10000) = 0
do number = number div 1000;
return number;
You can use this in a VBA function:
Public Function remove_ending_blanks(r As Range) As Double
Dim temp As Double
temp = r.Value
While temp Mod 10000 = 0
temp = temp / 1000
Wend
remove_ending_blanks = temp
End Function
You might also do this, using a formula, but the while-loop will need to be done using a circular reference, which is quite tricky.
Try this shorter formula solution and worked in left max. 3 zeros on the right side.
In B1, formula copied down :
=0+TRIM(LEFT(A1,MATCH(9^9,INDEX(1/MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1),0))+3))
Bit of a stretch (I'm prety sure it can be done better), but if you have access to TEXTJOIN, try the following in B2:
=IF(RIGHT(A1,4)="0000",FILTERXML("<t><s>"&TEXTJOIN("</s><s>",1,MID(A1,1,LEN(A1)-ROW(A$1:INDEX(A:A,LEN(A1)))))&"</s></t>","//s[substring(., string-length(.)-3) != 0]"),A1)
Or:
=IF(RIGHT(A7,4)="0000",LEFT(A7,MAX((MID(A7,ROW(A$1:INDEX(A:A,LEN(A7))),1)<>"0")*(ROW(A$1:INDEX(A:A,LEN(A7)))))+3),A7)
Note: It's an array formula and needs to be confirmed through CtrlShiftEnter
It looks frightening, agreed, but would yield the correct result as far as my testing went. For example 100000400000 would yield 1000004000.
you could use this formula
=IF(RIGHT(A1,4)="0000",LEFT(A1,LEN(A1/10^LEN(A1))-FIND(".",A1/10^LEN(A1))+3),A1)
Consider:
Public Function ZeroTrimmer(r As Range) As String
s = r.Text
While Right(s, 4) = "0000"
s = Left(s, Len(s) - 1)
Wend
ZeroTrimmer = s
End Function
Edit: These will give incorrect results. I mis-read the question and didn't realize you wanted to leave a max of 3 trailing zeroes. The below will remove all trailing zeroes.
If it's an unknown number of trailing zeroes, it gets tricky. You'd have to use something like this...
=(10^(LEN(RIGHT(VALUE(CONCATENATE("0.", A2)),LEN(VALUE(CONCATENATE("0.", A2)))-FIND(".",VALUE(CONCATENATE("0.", A2)))))))*VALUE(CONCATENATE("0.", A2))
If you know the number of trailing zeroes it becomes much easier, and can be done like this:
=LEFT(A2,LEN(A2)-3)
Where 3 in the above formula represents the number of trailing zeroes to remove. Another variation could be:
=A2/(10^3)
These formulas will work if text or numeric.
Is there an efficient way to identify the last character/string match in a string using base functions? I.e. not the last character/string of the string, but the position of a character/string's last occurrence in a string. Search and find both work left-to-right so I can't think how to apply without lengthy recursive algorithm. And this solution now seems obsolete.
I think I get what you mean. Let's say for example you want the right-most \ in the following string (which is stored in cell A1):
Drive:\Folder\SubFolder\Filename.ext
To get the position of the last \, you would use this formula:
=FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",(LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","")))/LEN("\")))
That tells us the right-most \ is at character 24. It does this by looking for "#" and substituting the very last "\" with an "#". It determines the last one by using
(len(string)-len(substitute(string, substring, "")))\len(substring)
In this scenario, the substring is simply "\" which has a length of 1, so you could leave off the division at the end and just use:
=FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",""))))
Now we can use that to get the folder path:
=LEFT(A1,FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","")))))
Here's the folder path without the trailing \
=LEFT(A1,FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",""))))-1)
And to get just the filename:
=MID(A1,FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",""))))+1,LEN(A1))
However, here is an alternate version of getting everything to the right of the last instance of a specific character. So using our same example, this would also return the file name:
=TRIM(RIGHT(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",REPT(" ",LEN(A1))),LEN(A1)))
How about creating a custom function and using that in your formula? VBA has a built-in function, InStrRev, that does exactly what you're looking for.
Put this in a new module:
Function RSearch(str As String, find As String)
RSearch = InStrRev(str, find)
End Function
And your function will look like this (assuming the original string is in B1):
=LEFT(B1,RSearch(B1,"\"))
New Answer | 31-3-2022:
With even newer functions come even shorter answers. At time of writing in BETA, but probably widely available in the near future, we can use TEXTBEFORE():
=LEN(TEXTBEFORE(A2,B2,-1))+1
The trick here is that the 3rd parameter tells the function to retrieve the last occurence of the substring we give in the 2nd parameter. At time of writing this function is still case-sensitive by default which could be handeld by the optional 4th parameter.
Original Answer | 17-6-2020:
With newer versions of excel come new functions and thus new methods. Though it's replicable in older versions (yet I have not seen it before), when one has Excel O365 one can use:
=MATCH(2,1/(MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),1)="Y"))
This can also be used to retrieve the last position of (overlapping) substrings:
=MATCH(2,1/(MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),2)="YY"))
| Value | Pattern | Formula | Position |
|--------|---------|------------------------------------------------|----------|
| XYYZ | Y | =MATCH(2,1/(MID(A2,SEQUENCE(LEN(A2)),1)="Y")) | 3 |
| XYYYZ | YY | =MATCH(2,1/(MID(A3,SEQUENCE(LEN(A3)),2)="YY")) | 3 |
| XYYYYZ | YY | =MATCH(2,1/(MID(A4,SEQUENCE(LEN(A4)),2)="YY")) | 4 |
Whilst this both allows us to no longer use an arbitrary replacement character and it allows overlapping patterns, the "downside" is the useage of an array.
Note: You can force the same behaviour in older Excel versions through either
=MATCH(2,1/(MID(A2,ROW(A1:INDEX(A:A,LEN(A2))),1)="Y"))
Entered through CtrlShiftEnter, or using an inline INDEX to get rid of implicit intersection:
=MATCH(2,INDEX(1/(MID(A2,ROW(A1:INDEX(A:A,LEN(A2))),1)="Y"),))
tigeravatar and Jean-François Corbett suggested to use this formula to generate the string right of the last occurrence of the "\" character
=TRIM(RIGHT(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",REPT(" ",LEN(A1))),LEN(A1)))
If the character used as separator is space, " ", then the formula has to be changed to:
=SUBSTITUTE(RIGHT(SUBSTITUTE(A1," ",REPT("{",LEN(A1))),LEN(A1)),"{","")
No need to mention, the "{" character can be replaced with any character that would not "normally" occur in the text to process.
Just came up with this solution, no VBA needed;
Find the last occurance of "_" in my example;
=IFERROR(FIND(CHAR(1);SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";CHAR(1);LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";"")));0)
Explained inside out;
SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";"") => replace "_" by spaces
LEN( *above* ) => count the chars
LEN(A1)- *above* => indicates amount of chars replaced (= occurrences of "_")
SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";CHAR(1); *above* ) => replace the Nth occurence of "_" by CHAR(1) (Nth = amount of chars replaced = the last one)
FIND(CHAR(1); *above* ) => Find the CHAR(1), being the last (replaced) occurance of "_" in our case
IFERROR( *above* ;"0") => in case no chars were found, return "0"
Hope this was helpful.
You could use this function I created to find the last instance of a string within a string.
Sure the accepted Excel formula works, but it's much too difficult to read and use. At some point you have to break out into smaller chunks so it's maintainable. My function below is readable, but that's irrelevant because you call it in a formula using named parameters. This makes using it simple.
Public Function FindLastCharOccurence(fromText As String, searchChar As String) As Integer
Dim lastOccur As Integer
lastOccur = -1
Dim i As Integer
i = 0
For i = Len(fromText) To 1 Step -1
If Mid(fromText, i, 1) = searchChar Then
lastOccur = i
Exit For
End If
Next i
FindLastCharOccurence = lastOccur
End Function
I use it like this:
=RIGHT(A2, LEN(A2) - FindLastCharOccurence(A2, "\"))
Considering a part of a Comment made by #SSilk my end goal has really been to get everything to the right of that last occurence an alternative approach with a very simple formula is to copy a column (say A) of strings and on the copy (say ColumnB) apply Find and Replace. For instance taking the example: Drive:\Folder\SubFolder\Filename.ext
This returns what remains (here Filename.ext) after the last instance of whatever character is chosen (here \) which is sometimes the objective anyway and facilitates finding the position of the last such character with a short formula such as:
=FIND(B1,A1)-1
I'm a little late to the party, but maybe this could help. The link in the question had a similar formula, but mine uses the IF() statement to get rid of errors.
If you're not afraid of Ctrl+Shift+Enter, you can do pretty well with an array formula.
String (in cell A1):
"one.two.three.four"
Formula:
{=MAX(IF(MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)))} use Ctrl+Shift+Enter
Result: 14
First,
ROW($1:$99)
returns an array of integers from 1 to 99: {1,2,3,4,...,98,99}.
Next,
MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)
returns an array of 1-length strings found in the target string, then returns blank strings after the length of the target string is reached: {"o","n","e",".",..."u","r","","",""...}
Next,
IF(MID(I16,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99))
compares each item in the array to the string "." and returns either the index of the character in the string or FALSE: {FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,4,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,8,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,14,FALSE,FALSE.....}
Last,
=MAX(IF(MID(I16,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)))
returns the maximum value of the array: 14
Advantages of this formula is that it is short, relatively easy to understand, and doesn't require any unique characters.
Disadvantages are the required use of Ctrl+Shift+Enter and the limitation on string length. This can be worked around with a variation shown below, but that variation uses the OFFSET() function which is a volatile (read: slow) function.
Not sure what the speed of this formula is vs. others.
Variations:
=MAX((MID(A1,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,,,LEN(A1))),1)=".")*ROW(OFFSET($A$1,,,LEN(A1)))) works the same way, but you don't have to worry about the length of the string
=SMALL(IF(MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)),2) determines the 2nd occurrence of the match
=LARGE(IF(MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)),2) determines the 2nd-to-last occurrence of the match
=MAX(IF(MID(I16,ROW($1:$99),2)=".t",ROW($1:$99))) matches a 2-character string **Make sure you change the last argument of the MID() function to the number of characters in the string you wish to match!
In newer versions of Excel (2013 and up) flash fill might be a simple and quick solution see: Using Flash Fill in Excel
.
For a string in A1 and substring in B1, use:
=XMATCH(B1,MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),LEN(B1)),,-1)
Working from inside out, MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),LEN(B1)) splits string A1 into a dynamic array of substrings, each the length of B1. To find the position of the last occurrence of substring B1, we use XMATCH with its Search_mode argument set to -1.
A simple way to do that in VBA is:
YourText = "c:\excel\text.txt"
xString = Mid(YourText, 2 + Len(YourText) - InStr(StrReverse(YourText), "\" ))
Very late to the party, but A simple solution is using VBA to create a custom function.
Add the function to VBA in the WorkBook, Worksheet, or a VBA Module
Function LastSegment(S, C)
LastSegment = Right(S, Len(S) - InStrRev(S, C))
End Function
Then the cell formula
=lastsegment(B1,"/")
in a cell and the string to be searched in cell B1 will populate the cell with the text trailing the last "/" from cell B1.
No length limit, no obscure formulas.
Only downside I can think is the need for a macro-enabled workbook.
Any user VBA Function can be called this way to return a value to a cell formula, including as a parameter to a builtin Excel function.
If you are going to use the function heavily you'll want to check for the case when the character is not in the string, then string is blank, etc.
If you're only looking for the position of the last instance of character "~" then
=len(substitute(String,"~",""))+1
I'm sure there is version that will work with the last instance of a string but I have to get back to work.
Cell A1 = find/the/position/of/the last slash
simple way to do it is reverse the text and then find the first slash as normal. Now you can get the length of the full text minus this number.
Like so:
=LEN(A1)-FIND("/",REVERSETEXT(A1),1)+1
This returns 21, the position of the last /
I'm a newbie on Excel.
So I have a list of some names ending with Hexa decimals. And some names, that doesn't have any.
My mission is to see only those names with Hexa decimals. (Mabye somehow filter them out)
Column:
BFAXSPOINTDEVBAUHOFLAN2AD
BFAXSQLBAUHOFLAN207
BFAXSQLDEVBAUHOFLAN27A
BFREPDEVBAUHOFLAN258
BFREPORTINGBAUHOFLAN20B
COBALTSEA02900
COBALTSEAVHOST900
DIRECTO8000
DIRECTO9000
DIRECTODCDIRECTOLA009
DYNAMAEBSSISE006
SURVEYEBSSISE006
KVMSRV00",
KVMSRV01",
KVMSRV02",
ASR
CACTI
DBSYNC",
DTV
and so on...
The Function HEX2DEC will help you achieve what you want - it attempts to convert a number as a hexidecimal, into a decimal. If it is not a valid Hex input, it will produce an error.
The key is understanding how many digits you expect your decimal to be - is it the last 5 characters; the last 10; etc. Also note that there is a risk that random text / numbers will be seen as hexidecimal when really that's not what it represents [but that's a problem with the question as you have laid it out; going solely based on the text provided, all we can see is whether a particular cell creates a valid Hexidecimal].
The full formula would look like this[assuming your data starts in A1, and that your Hexidecimal numbers are expected to be 6 characters long, this goes in B1 and is copied down]:
=ISERROR(HEX2DEC(RIGHT(A1,6)))
This takes the 6 rightmost characters of a cell, and attempts to convert it from Hex to Decimal. If it fails, it will produce TRUE [because of ISERROR]; if it succeeds, it will produce FALSE.
Then simply filter on your column to see the subset of results you care about.
Consider the following UDF:
Public Function EndsInHex(r As Range) As Boolean
Dim s As String, CH As String
s = r(1).Text
CH = Right(s, 1)
If CH Like "[A-F]" Or CH Like "[0-9]" Then
EndsInHex = True
Else
EndsInHex = False
End If
End Function
For the string to end in a hex, the last character must be a hex.
Is there an efficient way to identify the last character/string match in a string using base functions? I.e. not the last character/string of the string, but the position of a character/string's last occurrence in a string. Search and find both work left-to-right so I can't think how to apply without lengthy recursive algorithm. And this solution now seems obsolete.
I think I get what you mean. Let's say for example you want the right-most \ in the following string (which is stored in cell A1):
Drive:\Folder\SubFolder\Filename.ext
To get the position of the last \, you would use this formula:
=FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",(LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","")))/LEN("\")))
That tells us the right-most \ is at character 24. It does this by looking for "#" and substituting the very last "\" with an "#". It determines the last one by using
(len(string)-len(substitute(string, substring, "")))\len(substring)
In this scenario, the substring is simply "\" which has a length of 1, so you could leave off the division at the end and just use:
=FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",""))))
Now we can use that to get the folder path:
=LEFT(A1,FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","")))))
Here's the folder path without the trailing \
=LEFT(A1,FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",""))))-1)
And to get just the filename:
=MID(A1,FIND("#",SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\","#",LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",""))))+1,LEN(A1))
However, here is an alternate version of getting everything to the right of the last instance of a specific character. So using our same example, this would also return the file name:
=TRIM(RIGHT(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",REPT(" ",LEN(A1))),LEN(A1)))
How about creating a custom function and using that in your formula? VBA has a built-in function, InStrRev, that does exactly what you're looking for.
Put this in a new module:
Function RSearch(str As String, find As String)
RSearch = InStrRev(str, find)
End Function
And your function will look like this (assuming the original string is in B1):
=LEFT(B1,RSearch(B1,"\"))
New Answer | 31-3-2022:
With even newer functions come even shorter answers. At time of writing in BETA, but probably widely available in the near future, we can use TEXTBEFORE():
=LEN(TEXTBEFORE(A2,B2,-1))+1
The trick here is that the 3rd parameter tells the function to retrieve the last occurence of the substring we give in the 2nd parameter. At time of writing this function is still case-sensitive by default which could be handeld by the optional 4th parameter.
Original Answer | 17-6-2020:
With newer versions of excel come new functions and thus new methods. Though it's replicable in older versions (yet I have not seen it before), when one has Excel O365 one can use:
=MATCH(2,1/(MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),1)="Y"))
This can also be used to retrieve the last position of (overlapping) substrings:
=MATCH(2,1/(MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),2)="YY"))
| Value | Pattern | Formula | Position |
|--------|---------|------------------------------------------------|----------|
| XYYZ | Y | =MATCH(2,1/(MID(A2,SEQUENCE(LEN(A2)),1)="Y")) | 3 |
| XYYYZ | YY | =MATCH(2,1/(MID(A3,SEQUENCE(LEN(A3)),2)="YY")) | 3 |
| XYYYYZ | YY | =MATCH(2,1/(MID(A4,SEQUENCE(LEN(A4)),2)="YY")) | 4 |
Whilst this both allows us to no longer use an arbitrary replacement character and it allows overlapping patterns, the "downside" is the useage of an array.
Note: You can force the same behaviour in older Excel versions through either
=MATCH(2,1/(MID(A2,ROW(A1:INDEX(A:A,LEN(A2))),1)="Y"))
Entered through CtrlShiftEnter, or using an inline INDEX to get rid of implicit intersection:
=MATCH(2,INDEX(1/(MID(A2,ROW(A1:INDEX(A:A,LEN(A2))),1)="Y"),))
tigeravatar and Jean-François Corbett suggested to use this formula to generate the string right of the last occurrence of the "\" character
=TRIM(RIGHT(SUBSTITUTE(A1,"\",REPT(" ",LEN(A1))),LEN(A1)))
If the character used as separator is space, " ", then the formula has to be changed to:
=SUBSTITUTE(RIGHT(SUBSTITUTE(A1," ",REPT("{",LEN(A1))),LEN(A1)),"{","")
No need to mention, the "{" character can be replaced with any character that would not "normally" occur in the text to process.
Just came up with this solution, no VBA needed;
Find the last occurance of "_" in my example;
=IFERROR(FIND(CHAR(1);SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";CHAR(1);LEN(A1)-LEN(SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";"")));0)
Explained inside out;
SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";"") => replace "_" by spaces
LEN( *above* ) => count the chars
LEN(A1)- *above* => indicates amount of chars replaced (= occurrences of "_")
SUBSTITUTE(A1;"_";CHAR(1); *above* ) => replace the Nth occurence of "_" by CHAR(1) (Nth = amount of chars replaced = the last one)
FIND(CHAR(1); *above* ) => Find the CHAR(1), being the last (replaced) occurance of "_" in our case
IFERROR( *above* ;"0") => in case no chars were found, return "0"
Hope this was helpful.
You could use this function I created to find the last instance of a string within a string.
Sure the accepted Excel formula works, but it's much too difficult to read and use. At some point you have to break out into smaller chunks so it's maintainable. My function below is readable, but that's irrelevant because you call it in a formula using named parameters. This makes using it simple.
Public Function FindLastCharOccurence(fromText As String, searchChar As String) As Integer
Dim lastOccur As Integer
lastOccur = -1
Dim i As Integer
i = 0
For i = Len(fromText) To 1 Step -1
If Mid(fromText, i, 1) = searchChar Then
lastOccur = i
Exit For
End If
Next i
FindLastCharOccurence = lastOccur
End Function
I use it like this:
=RIGHT(A2, LEN(A2) - FindLastCharOccurence(A2, "\"))
Considering a part of a Comment made by #SSilk my end goal has really been to get everything to the right of that last occurence an alternative approach with a very simple formula is to copy a column (say A) of strings and on the copy (say ColumnB) apply Find and Replace. For instance taking the example: Drive:\Folder\SubFolder\Filename.ext
This returns what remains (here Filename.ext) after the last instance of whatever character is chosen (here \) which is sometimes the objective anyway and facilitates finding the position of the last such character with a short formula such as:
=FIND(B1,A1)-1
I'm a little late to the party, but maybe this could help. The link in the question had a similar formula, but mine uses the IF() statement to get rid of errors.
If you're not afraid of Ctrl+Shift+Enter, you can do pretty well with an array formula.
String (in cell A1):
"one.two.three.four"
Formula:
{=MAX(IF(MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)))} use Ctrl+Shift+Enter
Result: 14
First,
ROW($1:$99)
returns an array of integers from 1 to 99: {1,2,3,4,...,98,99}.
Next,
MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)
returns an array of 1-length strings found in the target string, then returns blank strings after the length of the target string is reached: {"o","n","e",".",..."u","r","","",""...}
Next,
IF(MID(I16,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99))
compares each item in the array to the string "." and returns either the index of the character in the string or FALSE: {FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,4,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,8,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,FALSE,14,FALSE,FALSE.....}
Last,
=MAX(IF(MID(I16,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)))
returns the maximum value of the array: 14
Advantages of this formula is that it is short, relatively easy to understand, and doesn't require any unique characters.
Disadvantages are the required use of Ctrl+Shift+Enter and the limitation on string length. This can be worked around with a variation shown below, but that variation uses the OFFSET() function which is a volatile (read: slow) function.
Not sure what the speed of this formula is vs. others.
Variations:
=MAX((MID(A1,ROW(OFFSET($A$1,,,LEN(A1))),1)=".")*ROW(OFFSET($A$1,,,LEN(A1)))) works the same way, but you don't have to worry about the length of the string
=SMALL(IF(MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)),2) determines the 2nd occurrence of the match
=LARGE(IF(MID(A1,ROW($1:$99),1)=".",ROW($1:$99)),2) determines the 2nd-to-last occurrence of the match
=MAX(IF(MID(I16,ROW($1:$99),2)=".t",ROW($1:$99))) matches a 2-character string **Make sure you change the last argument of the MID() function to the number of characters in the string you wish to match!
In newer versions of Excel (2013 and up) flash fill might be a simple and quick solution see: Using Flash Fill in Excel
.
For a string in A1 and substring in B1, use:
=XMATCH(B1,MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),LEN(B1)),,-1)
Working from inside out, MID(A1,SEQUENCE(LEN(A1)),LEN(B1)) splits string A1 into a dynamic array of substrings, each the length of B1. To find the position of the last occurrence of substring B1, we use XMATCH with its Search_mode argument set to -1.
A simple way to do that in VBA is:
YourText = "c:\excel\text.txt"
xString = Mid(YourText, 2 + Len(YourText) - InStr(StrReverse(YourText), "\" ))
Very late to the party, but A simple solution is using VBA to create a custom function.
Add the function to VBA in the WorkBook, Worksheet, or a VBA Module
Function LastSegment(S, C)
LastSegment = Right(S, Len(S) - InStrRev(S, C))
End Function
Then the cell formula
=lastsegment(B1,"/")
in a cell and the string to be searched in cell B1 will populate the cell with the text trailing the last "/" from cell B1.
No length limit, no obscure formulas.
Only downside I can think is the need for a macro-enabled workbook.
Any user VBA Function can be called this way to return a value to a cell formula, including as a parameter to a builtin Excel function.
If you are going to use the function heavily you'll want to check for the case when the character is not in the string, then string is blank, etc.
If you're only looking for the position of the last instance of character "~" then
=len(substitute(String,"~",""))+1
I'm sure there is version that will work with the last instance of a string but I have to get back to work.
Cell A1 = find/the/position/of/the last slash
simple way to do it is reverse the text and then find the first slash as normal. Now you can get the length of the full text minus this number.
Like so:
=LEN(A1)-FIND("/",REVERSETEXT(A1),1)+1
This returns 21, the position of the last /
If I am having G4ED7883666 and I want the output to be 7883666
and I have to apply this on a range of cells and they are not the same length and the only common thing is that I have to delete anything before the number that lies before the alphabet?
This formula finds the last number in a string, that is, all digits to the right of the last alpha character in the string.
=RIGHT(A1,MATCH(99,IFERROR(1*MID(A1,LEN(A1)+1-ROW($1:$25),1),99),0)-1)
Note that this is an array formula and must be entered with the Control-Shift-Enter keyboard combination.
How the formula works
Let's assume that the target string is fairly simple: "G4E78"
Working outward from the middle of the formula, the first thing to do is create an array with the elements 1 through 25. (Although this might seem to limit the formula to strings with no more than 25 characters, it actually places a limit of 25 digits on the size of the number that may be extracted by the formula.
ROW($1:$25) = {1;2;3;4;5;6;7; etc.}
Subtracting from this array the value of (1 + the length of the target string) produces a new array, the elements of which count down from the length of string. The first five elements will correspond to the position of the characters of the string - in reverse order!
LEN(A1)+1-ROW($1:$25) = {5;4;3;2;1;0;-1;-2;-3;-4; etc.}
The MID function then creates a new array that reverses the order of the characters of the string.
For example, the first element of the new array is the result of MID(A1, 5, 1), the second of MID(A1, 4, 1) and so on. The #VALUE! errors reflect the fact that MID cannot evaluate 0 or negative values as the position of a string, e.g., MID(A1,0,1) = #VALUE!.
MID(A1,LEN(A1)+1-ROW($1:$25),1) = {"8";"7";"E";"4";"G";#VALUE!;#VALUE!; etc.}
Multiplying the elements of the array by 1 turns the character elements of that array to #VALUE! errors as well.
=1*MID(A1,LEN(A1)+1-ROW($1:$25),1) = {"8";"7";#VALUE!;"4";#VALUE!;#VALUE!;#VALUE!; etc.}
And the IFERROR function turns the #VALUES into 99, which is just an arbitrary number greater than the value of a single digit.
IFERROR(1*MID(A1,LEN(A1)+1-ROW($1:$25),1),99) = {8;7;99;4;99;99;99; etc.}
Matching on the 99 gives the position of the first non-digit character counting from the right end of the string. In this case, "E" is the first non-digit in the reversed string "87E4G", at position 3. This is equivalent to saying that the number we are looking for at the end of the string, plus the "E", is 3 characters long.
MATCH(99,IFERROR(1*MID(A1,LEN(A1)+1-ROW($1:$25),1),99),0) = 3
So, for the final step, we take 3 - 1 (for the "E) characters from the right of string.
RIGHT(A1,MATCH(99,IFERROR(1*MID(A1,LEN(A1)+1-ROW($1:$25),1),99),0)-1) = "78"
One more submission for you to consider. This VBA function will get the right most digits before the first non-numeric character
Public Function GetRightNumbers(str As String)
Dim i As Integer
For i = Len(str) To 0 Step -1
If Not IsNumeric(Mid(str, i, 1)) Then
Exit For
End If
Next i
GetRightNumbers = Mid(str, i + 1)
End Function
You can write some VBA to format the data (just starting at the end and working back until you hit a non-number.)
Or you could (if you're happy to get an addin like Excelicious) then you can use regular expressions to format the text via a formula. An expression like [0-9]+$ would return all the numbers at the end of a string IIRC.
NOTE: This uses the regex pattern in James Snell's answer, so please upvote his answer if you find this useful.
Your best bet is to use a regular expression. You need to set a reference to VBScript Regular Expressions for this to work. Tools --> References...
Now you can use regex in your VBA.
This will find the numbers at the end of each cell. I am placing the result next to the original so that you can verify it is working the way you want. You can modify it to replace the cell as soon as you feel comfortable with it. The code works regardless of the length of the string you are evaluating, and will skip the cell if it doesn't find a match.
Sub GetTrailingNumbers()
Dim ws As Worksheet
Dim rng As Range
Dim cell As Range
Dim result As Object, results As Object
Dim regEx As New VBScript_RegExp_55.RegExp
Set ws = ThisWorkbook.Sheets("Sheet1")
' range is hard-coded here, but you can define
' it programatically based on the shape of your data
Set rng = ws.Range("A1:A3")
' pattern from James Snell's answer
regEx.Pattern = "[0-9]+$"
For Each cell In rng
If regEx.Test(cell.Value) Then
Set results = regEx.Execute(cell.Value)
For Each result In results
cell.Offset(, 1).Value = result.Value
Next result
End If
Next cell
End Sub
Takes the first 4 digits from the right of num:
num1=Right(num,4)
Takes the first 5 digits from the left of num:
num1=Left(num,5)
First takes the first ten digits from the left then takes the first four digits from the right:
num1=Right(Left(num, 10),4)
In your case:
num=G4ED7883666
num1=Right(num,7)