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InterpretDateFromText ( dateText ; noResult )

interpret a date from a date as text string

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Tim Anderson - Show more from this author Tim Anderson Group

  Function definition: (Copy & paste into FileMaker's Edit Custom Function window)

/* InterpretDateFromText ( dateText ; noResult ) by Tim Anderson Feb 2015 Updated 25 Feb 2015 to correct a typo (found by John Renfrew)- there was a capital 'J' in '["jan"; 1]'. Thanks for pointing this out John Will try and extract a date from text in a non standard format. Safely interprets dates in formats that FileMaker recognises e.g. 8th October 2009, 9 February 2010, November 1 2007, 8/1/2008, 8.7.11 You have the option - ‘noResult’ - on what to return if a valid date cannot be found. Note that the month name must be either complete or only the first 3 letters, if you want/need to extend this just add more pairs of parameters in the Substitute command, but make sure that you put them in order of the length of the replaced text - see September as an example. Needs no other functions */ Let ( [ _dateT=Lower(dateText); _str= Substitute( _dateT ;["january"; 1] ; ["jan"; 1] ; ["february"; 2] ; ["feb"; 2] ; ["march"; 3] ; ["mar"; 3] ; ["april"; 4] ; ["apr"; 4] ; ["may"; 5] ; ["june"; 6] ; ["jun"; 6] ; ["july"; 7] ; ["jul"; 7] ; ["august"; 8] ; ["aug"; 8] ; ["september"; 9] ; ["sept"; 9] ; ["sep"; 9] ; ["october"; 10] ; ["oct"; 10] ; ["november"; 11] ; ["nov"; 11] ; ["december"; 12] ; ["dec"; 12] ); _stripped = Substitute( _str ; [" " ;"/"]; [" ";"/"]; [".";"/"]); _filt = Filter( _stripped ;"0123456789/-" ); _first = Left( _dateT ;3); _monthFirst = Position ("janfebmaraprmayjunjulaugsepaugoctnovdev"; _first ; 1 ; 1 ) > 0; _date1=GetAsDate( _filt ); _res=Choose( _monthFirst ; _date1 ; Date( Day( _date1 ); Month( _date1 ); Year( _date1 )) ) ] ; Case( IsValid( GetAsDate( _res ) ); _res ; noResult ) ) Click to copy

Will try and extract a date from text in a non standard format. Safely interprets dates in formats that FileMaker recognises

e.g. 8th October 2009, 9 February 2010, November 1 2007, 8/1/2008, 8.7.11

You have the option - ‘noResult’ - on what to return if a valid date cannot be found. Note that the month name must be either complete or only the first 3 letters, if you want/need to extend this just add more pairs of parameters in the Substitute command, but make sure that you put them in order of the length of the replaced text - see September as an example.

 

Comments

		john renfrew, attitude Feb 25, 2015
Tim, typo ; ["Jan"; 1] ; should be ; ["jan"; 1] ;

		Tim Anderson, Tim Anderson Group Feb 25, 2015
Thanks John, corrected!

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