Avatar of Dumb_Blonde
Dumb_BlondeFlag for United States of America

asked on 

Parse text field into multiple values using multiple delimiters

I'm trying to split a long text field into multiple values using multiple delimiters. I found what I thought was the perfect solution here on EE posted by Alain Bryden (see below). I copied the code into a module in my DB. Using the function as written below was causing an Undefined function error. At the suggestion of an Expert, I made a few changes (in bold below) and was able to execute the function. The result returned is the value before the first delimiter. I was expecting it to return each delimited value in the string.

I'm just a business anlayst who's gotten stuck with trying to figure out how to do something using Access and VBA. I know I'm working with an array here and am wondering if I should be using something like GetRows. Unfortunately, I haven't the foggiest idea how to use it.

I'm at a loss here and rapidly running up against a deadline. Any help or suggestions you can offer would be much appreciated.

Function SplitMultiDelims(ByRef Text As String, ByRef DelimChars As String, _
        Optional ByVal IgnoreConsecutiveDelimiters As Boolean = False, _
        Optional ByVal Limit As Long = -1) As String()

Public Function SplitMultiDelims(ByRef Text As String, ByRef DelimChars As String, _
       Optional ByVal IgnoreConsecutiveDelimiters As Boolean = False, _
       Optional ByVal Limit As Long = -1) As String

    Dim ElemStart As Long, N As Long, M As Long, Elements As Long
    Dim lDelims As Long, lText As Long
    Dim Arr() As String
   
    lText = Len(Text)
    lDelims = Len(DelimChars)
    If lDelims = 0 Or lText = 0 Or Limit = 1 Then
        ReDim Arr(0 To 0)
        Arr(0) = Text
        SplitMultiDelims = Arr SplitMultiDelims = Arr(0)
        Exit Function
    End If
    ReDim Arr(0 To IIf(Limit = -1, lText - 1, Limit))
   
    Elements = 0: ElemStart = 1
    For N = 1 To lText
        If InStr(DelimChars, Mid(Text, N, 1)) Then
            Arr(Elements) = Mid(Text, ElemStart, N - ElemStart)
            If IgnoreConsecutiveDelimiters Then
                If Len(Arr(Elements)) > 0 Then Elements = Elements + 1
            Else
                Elements = Elements + 1
            End If
            ElemStart = N + 1
            If Elements + 1 = Limit Then Exit For
        End If
    Next N
    'Get the last token terminated by the end of the string into the array
    If ElemStart <= lText Then Arr(Elements) = Mid(Text, ElemStart)
    'Since the end of string counts as the terminating delimiter, if the last character
    'was also a delimiter, we treat the two as consecutive, and so ignore the last elemnent
    If IgnoreConsecutiveDelimiters Then If Len(Arr(Elements)) = 0 Then Elements = Elements - 1
   
    ReDim Preserve Arr(0 To Elements) 'Chop off unused array elements
    SplitMultiDelims = Arr SplitMultiDelims = Arr(0)
End Function
Microsoft Access

Avatar of undefined
Last Comment
Patrick Matthews
Avatar of borki
borki
Flag of Australia image

Perhaps you can post the code that you are using to CALL the above function and perhaps some test data and what you expect the function to return.
Avatar of Patrick Matthews
Dumb_Blonde,

Could you post a few rows of example data, along with the result you would expect based on that sample?

Patrick
Avatar of Dumb_Blonde
Dumb_Blonde
Flag of United States of America image

ASKER

I don't have any code that I'm calling this from. I used the function in a query expression. It's now obvious to me that it won't work using it in an expression in the query designer but I'm at a loss as to how to write the VBA code to do this. I'm guessing it requires some kind of a loop? In any event I have a column in the table called Narrative. The values in that table look like this:

"HO2, 2209/2210/2689/2690/2728/2729/2852/2947/3159/3160/3417/3431/3521/3522, Embedded, Cal Yr, CO/TO Yes"
I need the data parsed (using " ", "," and "/" as delimiters) into "HO2", "2209", "2210", "2689", "2690" etc. Ideally, each value in a seperate row but if I could get it parsed into columns in the same row I can work with it.

Thanks much.
Avatar of borki
borki
Flag of Australia image

The Split VBA code (without the Bolded modifications) works fine with your test data. The problem is really how you want to use the resulting data.

You mentioned that you would want the data in a separate row - you would need a new table for this, say:

ID - Autnumber
SourceRowID - some unique value of your original data row
Element - int, that represents the position of the parsed element in your array
Data - string, the actual data

You can then call your Split function as follows

Dim str As String, strArr() As String
Dim i As int
str = "HO2, 2209/2210/2689/2690/2728/2729/2852/2947/3159/3160/3417/3431/3521/3522, Embedded, Cal Yr, CO/TO Yes"
strArr = SplitMultiDelims(str, " ,/", True)
For i = 0 to UBound(strArr)
   Debug.Print i, strArr(i)
   'DoCmd.ExecuteSQL("INSERT INTO tblNew (fileds) VALUES (key, i, strArr(i))
Next i
Avatar of Dumb_Blonde
Dumb_Blonde
Flag of United States of America image

ASKER

I'm getting a compile error (Cannot assign to array) on this line:

strArr = SplitMultiDelims(str, " ,/", True)
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
Avatar of Patrick Matthews
Patrick Matthews
Flag of United States of America image

Blurred text
THIS SOLUTION IS ONLY AVAILABLE TO MEMBERS.
View this solution by signing up for a free trial.
Members can start a 7-Day free trial and enjoy unlimited access to the platform.
See Pricing Options
Start Free Trial
Avatar of Dumb_Blonde
Dumb_Blonde
Flag of United States of America image

ASKER

Patrick -- Thank you, thank you, thank youi! Not I was able to parse the data the way I needed but after spending some time with your article found that I could select just the values I really needed (4 digit numerics) by changing the pattern to "\d{4}".

Regards,
DB
Dumb_Blonde,

Glad to help!  If you have not already done so, I would really appreciate it if you could please return to my article
https://www.experts-exchange.com/Programming/Languages/Visual_Basic/A_1336-Using-Regular-Expressions-in-Visual-Basic-for-Applications-and-Visual-Basic-6.html
and click 'Yes' for the 'Was this helpful?' voting.

Patrick

Microsoft Access
Microsoft Access

Microsoft Access is a rapid application development (RAD) relational database tool. Access can be used for both desktop and web-based applications, and uses VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) as its coding language.

226K
Questions
--
Followers
--
Top Experts
Get a personalized solution from industry experts
Ask the experts
Read over 600 more reviews

TRUSTED BY

IBM logoIntel logoMicrosoft logoUbisoft logoSAP logo
Qualcomm logoCitrix Systems logoWorkday logoErnst & Young logo
High performer badgeUsers love us badge
LinkedIn logoFacebook logoX logoInstagram logoTikTok logoYouTube logo