String Manipulation Functions - Crosswalk to FoxPro/xBase function

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Paul Farseth - 18 Mar 2005 22:05 GMT

Dear Ones,

Is there any available crosswalk or translation guide or index that would
enable a person to find what SQL functions are available in ACCESS for
manipulating text strings? In particular, it would be helpful to have a list
of ACCESS SQL functions (and their syntax) that correspond to the string (and
number) manipulation functions found in the FoxPro/dBase/Clipper/xBase
programming languages that many of us grew up with. For example, what SQL
function in ACCESS would correspond to the xBase function
AT(<ExpC1>,<ExpC2>) which returns the byte number of the starting position
of text string <ExpC1> within text string <ExpC2>. Another string function
that would be nice to find would be the equivalent of the xBase function
REPLICATE(<ExpC>,<ExpN>) which replicates a character expression N times.

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Dirk Goldgar - 18 Mar 2005 22:27 GMT

> Dear Ones,
>
[quoted text clipped - 11 lines]
> REPLICATE(<ExpC>,<ExpN>) which replicates a character expression N
> times.

The equivalents are actually VBA functions, which you can call inside
Access queries as well as in code. You can't use them in queries that
are executed from outside of Access.

I don't know if there's a crosswalk, but if you open the help file and
navigate to Programming in Visual Basic -> Visual Basic Language
Reference -> Functions, you can look down the list of functions and find
out the details on each.

I don't know FoxPro very well. For the specific functions you ask
about, I think the equivalent of AT is InStr(). I don't think there's
an exact equivalent to REPLICATE -- there's a function String(), but it
duplicates a single character, not an arbitrary character expression.
You can always write your own VBA function to do that, and use it in
queries within the database wherein it is defined, or which have a
reference to the defining database).

Signature

Dirk Goldgar, MS Access MVP
www.datagnostics.com

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