[Solved]What command to crop a cell's contents?

aeroian · Newbie Joined: 25 Jun 2010 Posts: 1

Hi,

I have a column of data with cells that contain a long mix of characters and numbers...how can i crop the data in these cells to contain only the first 5 letters/numbers in the cell, and drop the rest?

I have been racking my brain as to how to do this and I was hoping folks here could help. I'm not sure what to search for so I'm sorry if this has been asked before!

Thanks

~Ian

Robert Tucker · Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2010 3:07 am Post subject:

Select column.

Open search/replace Ctrl+F. Search for: \<(.{5}).*\> Replace with: $1

Under "More Options" check "Current selection only" and "Regular expressions".

Replace All.
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ken johnson · Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2010 3:16 am Post subject:

Say the values to be cropped are in column A.
In the next available empty column enter this formula...
=LEFT(TRIM(A1);5)
Fill this formula down as far as needed.
Copy the results of the formula then go Edit|Paste Special to bring up the "Paste Special" dialog. Under the "Selection" heading deselect "Paste all", select "Text strings" and deselect all the other options. Click OK.
If you a satisfied with the results you can use copy/paste to replace the original column A values with the cropped values.

Ken Johnson
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