MiddleWords()

MiddleWords()

Category: Text

Syntax: MiddleWords ( text ; startingWord ; numberOfWords )

Parameters: text ”any expression that resolves to a text string; startingWord ”any positive number or expression that returns a positive number; numberOfWords ”any positive number or expression that returns a positive number.

Description: The MiddleWords() function extracts a substring from the middle of a text string. The substring begins with the n th word of the text string (where n represents the startingWord parameter) and extends for the number of words specified by the third parameter.

Examples:

 MiddleWords ("the quick brown fox jumps" ; 3 ; 2) 

Returns brown fox .

 MiddleWords (FullName" ; 2 ; 1) 

Returns Allan when FullName contains "Edgar Allan Poe."

Comments:

MiddleWords(text; 1 ; 1) and LeftWords (text; 1) are equivalent functions.

Be aware of what symbols are considered to be word breaks by FileMaker Pro. Spaces, return characters , and most punctuation symbols are considered to be word breaks. Multiple word breaks next to each other (for example, two spaces, a comma and a space) are considered as a single word break.

Certain punctuation symbols are word breaks when separating alpha characters, but not when separating numeric characters. These include the colon (:), slash (/), period (.), comma (,), and dash (-). The reason for this behavior is that those symbols are valid date, time, and number separators.

Leading and trailing punctuation around a word may be ignored by the MiddleWords() function. For example, MiddleWords ("John Q. Public, Jr."; 2 ; 1) returns Q , but MiddleWords ("John Q. Public, Jr."; 2; 1) returns Q. Public .