Looks like a wildcard would work: Any ideas VB 6.0 VS Access

[Dököll]

Greetings Again, All!

I know a bit more of the back end of things than front. Every now and then I use wildcard to retrieve data via sql advantage, oracle, and of course, our beloved MS Access ;-) I can't seem to find a wild card that will work in VB 6.
in spl advantage Ic an ue a 'Sam%' to find all Sam(s) and '%Sam' for Sam like, Example Samuel would show up here. Is there such a thing in VB 6, recent searches and reading hve come up empty, VB in "twenty one days" is useless; any ideas!

Dököll

[Dököll]

Greetings Again, All!

I know a bit more of the back end of things than front. Every now and then I use wildcard to retrieve data via sql advantage, oracle, and of course, our beloved MS Access ;-) I can't seem to find a wild card that will work in VB 6.
in spl advantage Ic an ue a 'Sam%' to find all Sam(s) and '%Sam' for Sam like, Example Samuel would show up here. Is there such a thing in VB 6, recent searches and reading hve come up empty, VB in "twenty one days" is useless; any ideas!

Dököll

For got to post what I hd in mind, let's say it were:

Dim GoSplit As Variant
Dim strGetWords As String
 
FileName = "\usermate.txt"
f = FreeFile
Open App.Path + FileName For Input As 1
Do While Not EOF(f)
Line Input #1, strGetWords
GoSplit = Split(strGetWords, " ")
 
If strGetWords$ like "bus" <> 0 Then  '  want bus but I also get bus from busted
'Is there anything to add here that would make only the instance of bus to pop up
 
'Adding asterisk as in "bus*" give me nada, not a thing...
 
Text4(8).Text = "bus"
End If
 
'What I hope to do make sure "busted" is not picked up since "bus" gets picked up from "busted"
 
I am posting this because I did find a solution.  If you recall, I decided to set visibility to false for the text bx that would have carried "bus" if "busted" was found.  The problem is I had an error 'procedure too large, proof that my if statement was out of this world.  A wildcard woul greatly reduce my risks, I do not appreciate that pop up too much "Procedure Too LARGE!" what is that?
 
What are yur thoughts on this?
 
Dököll
 
 

[Killer42]

You should check the online help for the Like operator, but I think you'll find the asterisk (*) is the wildcard character you're after.

[Dököll]

You should check the online help for the Like operator, but I think you'll find the asterisk (*) is the wildcard character you're after.

I'll give it a whirl, many thanks...I'm surprised 'help' included with thr software did no provide much assistance. Will let you know...

[Dököll]

I think I figured out why (*) as wildcard is not working through VB 6.0 Professional. Checked Knowledge base, my attempt is to grab what I want from a .txt file where text (lyrical conten) would be temporarily stored. VB does give me the option to use the Like operator but to retrieve from an access database (Recordset) or other. I should have been more specific (VB 6.0 Vs .txt file). I will shrink the code in hopes that'll do the trick. Thanks for your support and assistance. I'll post my findings here when found, should help us tackle this mistery...

Dököll

[Killer42]

According to the doco...

Like Operator Example
This example uses the Like operator to compare a string to a pattern.

Dim MyCheck
MyCheck = "aBBBa" Like "a*a"   ' Returns True.
MyCheck = "F" Like "[A-Z]"     ' Returns True.
MyCheck = "F" Like "[!A-Z]"    ' Returns False.
MyCheck = "a2a" Like "a#a"     ' Returns True.
MyCheck = "aM5b" Like "a[L-P]#[!c-e]"  ' Returns True.
MyCheck = "BAT123khg" Like "B?T*"      ' Returns True.
MyCheck = "CAT123khg" Like "B?T*"      ' Returns False.

I've just tested the second example in plain VB6, and it worked. I found that when looking it up in the MSDN doco, it had two entries - VB and VBA. As is (for some weird reason) so often the case, selecting VBA gave me the relevant info, while VB gave me the info relating to an SQL query.

[Dököll]

According to the doco...I've just tested the second example in plain VB6, and it worked. I found that when looking it up in the MSDN doco, it had two entries - VB and VBA. As is (for some weird reason) so often the case, selecting VBA gave me the relevant info, while VB gave me the info relating to an SQL query.

Indeed, Saw it too, thought it to be helpful, but I have to admit I do not quite understand it, nor can I use it it seems. The txt file is added then read straight away. Seems like a wild card does not work for a .txt file, here is another protion of the code:

Private Sub GtWords_Click()
 
If Text6.Text = "" Then
MsgBox ("Looks, you forgot to add a lyric please add lyrical text to continue!")
Text6.SetFocus
ElseIf Text6.Text <> "" Then      
 
Open App.Path + "\usermate.txt" For Output As #1 'file is opened as inWrite because it is Writing back into the program
                Write #1, , Text6.Text
 
                Close #1
 
Dim GoSplit As Variant
Dim strGetWords As String
 
FileName = "\usermate.txt"
f = FreeFile
Open App.Path + FileName For Input As #1
Do While Not EOF(f)
Line Input #1, strGetWords
GoSplit = Split(strGetWords, " ")
 
 

'This helps record the whole text from Text6 andbe read to find words collected. As we exchange notes, I am begining to see perhpas, the text must be added already formatted, therefore no "bus" even though busted is found (busted is not among words to find in text. We're still looking...thank you by te way, for posting your example from the microsoft site, I think I'll plug in some of it, trweak it see what happens. Again I have yet to undertstand it:

The SQL command I will be using later on will support your helpful comment previously added, fuzzy a bit, I think I should be good. It looks as though this sort of a command will not work to grab the absolute value:::::::::: ::::Whoa, Do you know about abolutevalue in VB, I learned there was such athing. What if I looked for the abolute value in strGetWords$, would that do the trick. Gotta go....

Dököll, thanks for posting

[Killer42]

Indeed, Saw it too, thought it to be helpful, but I have to admit I do not quite understand it, nor can I use it it seems. The txt file is added then read straight away. Seems like a wild card does not work for a .txt file

I'm afraid I couldn't really tell much from the code.

Could you give more detail on exactly how the Like operator "doesn't work"? Maybe it's something we can fix, because I've tested one or two of the samples from the documentation, and it definitely did work. I don't see how a text file being involved would affect it.

As for "abolute value" :- if you mean absolute value, then that is basically just a number without taking the sign into account. So for example, Abs(-3) and Abs(3) would both return the value 3. I don't see how it would apply to a string.

[Dököll]

I'm afraid I couldn't really tell much from the code.

Could you give more detail on exactly how the Like operator "doesn't work"? Maybe it's something we can fix, because I've tested one or two of the samples from the documentation, and it definitely did work. I don't see how a text file being involved would affect it.

As for "abolute value" :- if you mean absolute value, then that is basically just a number without taking the sign into account. So for example, Abs(-3) and Abs(3) would both return the value 3. I don't see how it would apply to a string.

Right on point, I spoke too soon, thanks for replying. The like operator works when I send the words found to an Access database, whereby frequent hits to it, unsing a wildcard (*), grabs all instances of "bus" inthe database. The problem is before the text is formatted to reflect exactly what the program asked, the format is useless; it's as if pickingup a dictionary and looking up words. When GtWords button is pushed, the code I previously posted starts running, accompagnied by a series of if statements, as in this posted solution:

Dim GoSplit As Variant
Dim strGetWords As String

FileName = "\usermate. txt"
f = FreeFile
Open App.Path + FileName For Input As 1
Do While Not EOF(f)
Line Input #1, strGetWords
GoSplit = Split(strGetWor ds, " ")

If InStrB(strGetWo rds$, "busted") <> 0 Then

Text4(9).Text = "busted"
convert_my_text ="BUSTED
convert_me_modu .change_it_now 'this fires up my module named conert_me_modu
End If


''''''Additiona l if statements are added here,

My Module

Public convert_my_text As String

Public Sub change_it_now ()

If UCase(convert_m y_text) = "BUSTED" Then
'first value performed
LyricalContentf ind.Text4(9).Te xt = ""
'empty string works here, no need to set vsibilty to false
End If

End Sub


'This is working, but I will need to also tell VB the words I do not need it to find, thus busted. A wildcard, if it exists for searching a .txt file should do the trick, since searching the actual database "Bus*" does in fact give me "Bus", addded/found from different text, typed my son's "the magic school bus" grabbed "the wheels on the bus" as well from my database; this means, my recordset had two hits for bus...

If a 'something_wild card' can be used for .txt, whether it picks up "bus" a number of times, the results will be specific to only "bus" not busted. I attempting vbTextCompare again, perhaps something's a miss. Oh! here is what my Like operator atttempt loked like:

If strGetWords$ Like "dancing" <> 0 Then
Text17(10).Text = "Dancing"
End If

'If you typed up godancing, you got dancing out of that. I gt an idea :-)
In a bit!

[Killer42]

Oh! here is what my Like operator atttempt loked like:

If strGetWords$ Like "dancing" <> 0 Then
Text17(10).Text = "Dancing"
End If

'If you typed up godancing, you got dancing out of that. I gt an idea :-)
In a bit!

I suppose it might depend on the Option Compare setting, which I've never touched. But as far as I know, that Like comparison will return the same result as using the = operator. The whole point of Like is that it allows you to use wildcards to indicate patterns or unknown parts in the string. By the way, the <> 0 is pointless, as well. The only two values that might be returned from the Like comparison are True (-1) and False (0). You’d do better to say If strGetWords$ Like "whatever" Then

How's this for an idea? If you have a string and you want to check whether a specific word appears within it, say "dancing", and you don't care about the case (upper/lower), perhaps you could use this...

If Lcase(strGetWords$) Like "* dancing *"0 Then
  …
End If

You might also want to try this, to account for words at the start or end of the string.

If Lcase(strGetWords$) Like "* dancing *" _
    Or Lcase(strGetWords$) Like "dancing *" _
    Or Lcase(strGetWords$) Like "* dancing" _
    Then
       …
End If

One thing I don't understand is this. If you have already used Split to separate the string into words, why don't you just loop through and use = to check each of them?