Compare first 3 characters in 2 columns

[eezo89]

Hello everyone,

I'm kind of in a pickle. So here's what I need:

[TABLE="width: 303"]
<colgroup><col span="3"></colgroup><tbody>[TR]
[TD]A[/TD]
[TD]B[/TD]
[TD]C[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R5[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R5[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R5[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R5[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R6L[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R5[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R5[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R6L[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]R6L[/TD]
[TD]R6L+[/TD]
[TD]FALSE
[/TD]
[/TR]
</tbody>[/TABLE]


So there are my columns for example. I need a formula to compare first three characters in columns A and B. If they match, come up as TRUE instead of FALSE. Basically I want to ditch the + sign. It's irrelevant. I have thousands of these rows, so I can't do it manually.

Help! :D

Thank you! ^^

 

[Eric W]

Welcome to the Board.

Maybe:

=A1=LEFT(B1,LEN(A1))

 

[Joe4]

Welcome to the Board!

Some of your entries only contain two characters, so depending on how you are comparing, always taking three characters might not work.
Are you always comparing the same row when comparing columns A and B?

Note, if you really don't care about the "+" sign, you can easily remove them all at once, using Find/Replace and replacing + with nothing, and updating all at once.
Then you don't need to worry about coming up with special formulas.

 

[eezo89]

Thank you!

Okay that worked. I think it will suffice. Appreciated!

 

[eezo89]

Sorry, my bad, that didn't really work in the end :/
I got really different results throughout the column.

I know about the replacement, I need the + signs for another tab. It has to stay unfortunately.

 

[Eric W]

Did you try Joe's idea, or mine? The formula I provided compares the 2 columns for the length of the value in the first column. So if the value has 2 characters or 3, that's what it compares. You shouldn't need to remove the + sign.