Unique Abbreviation Problem

[HunterA]

Hello, I am trying to extract abbreviations from a string of words and display them in a new cell.

The abbreviations are as follows:

Wheat; W
Dairy; D
Egg; E
Fish; F
Shellfish; SH
Soy; S
Peanut; P
Tree Nut; TN
Vegan; VGN
Vegetarian; V


The Strings can be any combination of any or all of these in a single cell as follows (commas and all):

Wheat, Dairy, Egg, Soy, Vegetarian

or simply

Vegan


I can hide columns or use a back sheet, but it has to be automatic (for people who really dont know how to use excel), and without VBA (security wont allow VBA to pass through email.)


Can anybody help!!!?

I had someone suggest a comma delimited separation into columns, and then abbreviate, and then concatenate them but it isn't foolproof enough, or automatic.


Thanks in advance for anybodys suggestions!

-Alex

 

[HunterA]

I did not mention the strings I would like to return in a single cell for the above two examples would be "W, D, E, S, V" and "VGN"

 

[Peter_SSs]

Welcome to the MrExcel board!

I have made the following assumptions:
- There will be at most 20 items listed in a single cell in column A (we can expand though if needed)
- Since you have novice users, there could be inconsistencies with the comma space between the listed items. One consequence of my attempt to deal with that is the lookup list in columns X:Y below contains "TreeNut" not "Tree Nut" but I don't think that should worry your users as, in any case, that list may well be hidden or on another sheet?
- The sheet will be used with Excel through Office 365. Further note below my screen shot in case this assumption is incorrect.

Lookup list is housed in X2:Y21 (allowing for 20 items)
Formula in C2 is copied across to V2 (20 columns) and down
Formula in B2 is copied down.
All columns except A & B could be hidden after data/formulas have been added

Excel Workbook
	A	B	C	D	E	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N	O	P	Q	R	S	T	U	V	W	X	Y
1
2	Wheat, Dairy, Egg, Soy, Vegetarian	W, D, E, S, V	W	D	E	S	V																	Wheat	W
3	Vegan	VGN	VGN																					Dairy	D
4	Peanut, Tree Nut, Fish	P, TN, F	P	TN	F																			Egg	E
5																								Fish	F
6																								Shellfish	SH
7																								Soy	S
8																								Peanut	P
9																								TreeNut	TN
10																								Vegan	VGN
11																								Vegetarian	V
12
Abbreviations

If you don't have an Excel version with the TEXTJOIN function, then the formula in B2 could be

=SUBSTITUTE(TRIM(C2&" "&D2&" "&E2&" "&F2&" "&G2&" "&H2&" "&I2&" "&J2&" "&K2&" "&L2&" "&M2&" "&N2&" "&O2&" "&P2&" "&Q2&" "&R2&" "&S2&" "&T2&" "&U2&" "&V2)," ",", ")

 

[HunterA]

Peter, this is awesome.

Thanks so much!!

 

[Peter_SSs]

Peter, this is awesome.

Thanks so much!!

You are very welcome. Thanks for letting us know.