CNTL H / SEARCH & REPLACE

[kevandsue]

I am using a trial version of the software which I am very happy with .

Unfortunately I find that the Cntl-H (search & replace) function does not work in the edit menu (it is greyed out).

Is this because I am using a trial version and is there any other functionality that is restricted.

NB - I also find that sorting a table only works if there is less than 1000 records.

Regards

Kevin

[Ken]

Hi Kevin,

Glad to hear that you're enjoying the software. There are no limitations in the trial version, other than it stops working after 30 days. That said, here's what I think it happening on both of the issues you've mentioned:

REPLACE

Because its more common to replace in bulk in a database, the Find/Replace doesn't work quite the same way as it would in, say, a Word Processor. The File > Replace mechanism (ctrl + H) only works in the scripting editor. So, if you are writing a script and need to find/replace, this is the way you'd do it.

However, you can indeed replace data in your table as well by using the Update Records panel (Data > Update Records).

For more information on the replace/update functionality take a look at the help page here:

http://www.kirix.com/help/docs/replacin ... ecords.htm


SORTING

In version 4.2 there is a known glitch where sorting may not work correctly if any of the following things are true:

1. The table name has spaces in it. If this is the case, just double click the name in the project tree and add an underscore (change "my table" to "my_table")

2. Field names have spaces in them. In this case, toggle to the structure view (View > Design View) and double click on the fields with spaces in them to rename ("my field" to "my_field").

If this fix doesn't work, please let us know and we'll debug it further. Our next iteration of the software should be out in the next month (it will be available as a free upgrade to any purchasers of 4.2) which will fix this spacing problem.


Also, if you need any help with the replace/update dialog, just let me know and I'll be happy to help.

All the best,
ken

[kevandsue]

Thanks for that

The sorting issue I did eventually work out and the search replace I have done through excel.

The problem was phone numbers that have difference suffixes / prefixes that needed to be striped out of the data.

Regards

Kevin

[Ken]

Hi Kevin,

Glad you worked it out. You can also use calculated fields in Strata to great effect for cleaning up dirty data like telephone numbers. Check out the "Calculations and Formulas" video here:

http://www.kirix.com/strata/portal

About halfway through we show how you can clean up a telephone field by translating things like parentheses, slashes and spaces into hyphens to get a consistent formatting. Also, if you know how to use regular expressions, these are also available via calculated fields.

Best,
ken