topic Which function could quickly remove the blank in front of string? in Discussions

Which function could quickly remove the blank in front of string?

judith — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 19:44:14 GMT

Which function could I use to remove the blank in front of string? Is there any function that works like left() of SAS? Thanks.

pmroz — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:26:32 GMT

There doesn't appear to be an LTRIM function. Here's one way to do it, using a regular expression.

Function Name: ltrim

Description: Trim any spaces on the left side of a string.

Arguments:

in_string String to do the left trim on

Sample calls:

a = " ddd eee fff ";

print(ltrim(a));

c = "abcde";

print(ltrim(c));

ltrim = Function( {in_string},

{Default Local},

// Use the regular expression "^ *" which means start at the beginning of the string

// and match any number of sequential spaces

start_nonspace = length(Regex(in_string, "^ *"));

ltrim_string = substr(in_string, (start_nonspace+1));

ltrim_string;

);

judith — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:45:48 GMT

Thanks a lot for your instruction again. Your answer is always helpful.

ms — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:46:15 GMT

Trim() supports an optional "left", "both" or "right" argument. Default is to trim trailing whitespace at both ends.

s = " Column Name ";

Trim( s, left );

judith — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 20:52:29 GMT

That was a quick and simple answer. Thanks for your input.

pmroz — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:24:53 GMT

I should have RTFM'd. Thanks for pointing that out MS!