Getting left and right expression values

[Bruce Easton]

Stanley - I have a few more comments (inline).  Bruce

On 4/23/12 11:59 PM, Stanley - stanlyn-com wrote:
> Hi Bruce,
>
> [..]
>
> In this datetime example, I am using the approach you suggested and if I
> need to do date math on it, I just assign it to a variable with the date
> datatype, like aa(yymd/,10).
>
>> There is no 'right' function in filepro
> This is a real bummer?  Is there an easy way to get the time part of these 2
> strings?
> 1. "Error 123, The prob is in customers... 20120423 0412"
> 2. "Error 33, Bad Index... 20120521 0322"
>
> It appears that a trim is implied, but the problem is knowing where the time
> part is.  If we could read from the trimmed variable/field right side, then
> it would be easy...
For fields holding variable-length strings, you can always grab a specific
number of chars from the end of the string (assume below that
'errorExpression' is a long var that has already been set to either
#1 or #2 of your example above):

Then: aa=errorExpression{""       '(aa should be undeclared)
Then: ab(3,.0)=len(aa)
Then: lcTime=mid(aa,(ab-"3"),"4"); lcDate=mid(aa,(ab-"12"),"8")

Of course this assumes that in these expressions, that each ends with
the same date_time format.
>
>> why are you combining a date and time into one field
> Simple, it's all in one field, and if you had left and right functions then
> getting at any of its data is simple and fast and much easier to maintain
> than 2 separate fields.  Also note that what I'm saying here is useful for
> any string and date time data types, as I previously mentioned it's easy to
> convert a string to a date or time types.
>
> Also, another reason is that I'm out of automatic indexes... As A-P is
> SEVERELY limiting...
Ah - well this would have to be THE reason for me not to have
separate fields for dates and times for whatever filepro file is
storing the data for this app, because otherwise, everything is
more difficult than it needs to be with respect to sorting and
math.  You can get more indexes in version 5.7.
>
> Is there any of getting seconds into the time part as in "11:25:50"?
I don't understand how this relates to the discussion above,
but you can have seconds stored in a field with either edit
type 'TIME' or 'HMS' depending on how you plan to use it
(but where you want filepro to know that it is a time field
that can be sorted and operated on accordingly).
>
> Thanks, Stanley
>
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: filepro-list-bounces+stanley=stanlyn.com at lists.celestial.com
> [mailto:filepro-list-bounces+stanley=stanlyn.com at lists.celestial.com] On
> Behalf Of Bruce Easton
> Sent: Monday, April 23, 2012 11:14 PM
> To: filepro-list at lists.celestial.com
> Subject: Re: Getting left and right expression values
>
> Stanley,
>
> There is no 'right' function in filepro.  filepro's 'mid()', as Ken said,
> can take care of all of your needs for extracting part of a string.  You can
> also use a dummy or long-variable field declared with a specific length to
> effectively truncate a field at the desired point (and give you a 'left'
> part):
>
> Then:  declare dateportion(10,*)
> Then:  dateportion = datetimefield
>
>
> Just curious, but possibly more importantly, why are you combining a date
> and time into one field?  With filepro's turbo-charged, other-worldy
> abilities to sort and do math on dates and times as separate and special
> data types, why ever do that?   Maybe many years ago when, in
> filepro, you could not create auto indexes on non-contiguous fields, but....
> Or maybe I misunderstood and you are not actually storing the data that
> way....
>
> Bruce
>
> Bruce Easton
> STN, Inc.
>
>
> On 4/23/12 10:30 PM, Stanley - stanlyn-com wrote:
>> Hi Ken,
>>
>>> Use MID(), which is the equivalent of your substr() example.
>> OK, yes I see that, and thanks...
>>
>> Now, what about the left and right functions?  How would you get those
>> parts out of a string?
>>
>> Thanks, Stanley
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Kenneth Brody [mailto:kenbrody at spamcop.net]
>> Sent: Monday, April 23, 2012 10:21 PM
>> To: Stanley - stanlyn-com
>> Cc: Filepro-list at lists.celestial.com
>> Subject: Re: Getting left and right expression values
>>
>> On 4/23/2012 9:49 PM, Stanley - stanlyn-com wrote:
>>> Hi,
>> [...]
>>> How do I get just the date part and/or the time part?  In the other
>>> languages I use we have a left and right functions that returns
>>> values from the left or right as in:
>> [...]
>>> Also what about a function that would return a string starting at a
>>> known position and for x number of characters, such as
>>> lcString=substr(datetimefield, 7,6) where lcString would be equal to
>>> "4/23 2"
>>>
>>> I use this kind of stuff all the time in other languages and don't
>>> see any easy way of doing it in filePro.
>> [...]
>>
>> Use MID(), which is the equivalent of your substr() example.
>>
>> --
>> Kenneth Brody
>>
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