Find first non-space (special) character in cell

siers

New Member
Joined
Aug 21, 2014
Messages
13
Hi All,

I'm hoping to find a formula that can identify the position of the first non-space or special character in a cell.


For example, I have three cells with the following data:

Abcde efgh - ijklmn op qrs tuvwzyz

Abc dee (fgh ijklmn opqr stuv wzyz)

Abcd: eefgh ijkl mnop qrstuv wzyz


The desired formula would return the following for each cell:

12
9
5


Thanks,
Jeff
 

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Maybe a UDF (User Defined Function)

Alt+F11 ti open the VBEditor

Menu
Insert > Module

Paste code below in the right panel
Code:
Function GetSpChar(s As String)
    Dim i As Long
    
    For i = 1 To Len(s)
        If Mid(s, i, 1) Like "[! A-Za-z1-9]" Then
            GetSpChar = i
            Exit Function
        End If
    Next i
End Function

Excel

[Table="class: grid"][tr][td="bgcolor: #DCE6F1"][/td][td="bgcolor: #DCE6F1"]
A
[/td][td="bgcolor: #DCE6F1"]
B
[/td][/tr]
[tr][td="bgcolor: #DCE6F1"]
1
[/td][td]
Text​
[/td][td]
Result​
[/td][/tr]

[tr][td="bgcolor: #DCE6F1"]
2
[/td][td]
Abcde efgh - ijklmn op qrs tuvwzyz​
[/td][td]
12​
[/td][/tr]

[tr][td="bgcolor: #DCE6F1"]
3
[/td][td]
Abc dee (fgh ijklmn opqr stuv wzyz)​
[/td][td]
9​
[/td][/tr]

[tr][td="bgcolor: #DCE6F1"]
4
[/td][td]
Abcd: eefgh ijkl mnop qrstuv wzyz​
[/td][td]
5​
[/td][/tr]
[/table]


Formula in B2 copied down
=GetSpChar(A2)

Hope this helps

M.
 
Upvote 0
Maybe a UDF (User Defined Function)

Alt+F11 ti open the VBEditor

Menu
Insert > Module

Paste code below in the right panel
Code:
Function GetSpChar(s As String)
    Dim i As Long
    
    For i = 1 To Len(s)
        If Mid(s, i, 1) Like "[! A-Za-z[B][COLOR="#FF0000"][SIZE=2]1[/SIZE][/COLOR][/B]-9]" Then
            GetSpChar = i
            Exit Function
        End If
    Next i
End Function
Typo alert... the highlighted 1 should be a 0
 
Upvote 0
Another way.

Code:
Function SPECIAL(s As String) As Variant
Dim RX As Object: Set RX = CreateObject("VBScript.RegExp")

With RX
    .Pattern = "[^\w\s]"
    Set matches = .Execute(s)
End With

SPECIAL = InStr(s, matches(0))

End Function
 
Upvote 0

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