Hello!
I hope someone could help me with this issue, I've been struggling with it a lot.
I'm trying to use advanced filter in excel, which generally looks for exact matches, but you can use wildcards, like "*".
The problem emerges when I put an * to the beginning of the searched text. For some strange reason, it also allows everything after the searched text.
E.g.:
I search for: "* - xyproductname"
Expected result to return: "This is a question - xyproductname"
Expected result to not return: "This is a question - xyproductname and some more random text"
But it returns both!
Do you know why that could be? Thanks in advance!
Hello,
You don’t specify what function you use, but as you use wildcards I assume you use the SEARCH function.
A good article to read about searching in Excel is found here.
As mentioned in the article, the syntax for the SEARCH function is =SEARCH(find_text, witin_text, [start_num]).
But as SEARCH function gives the position number of the first character when found a match, I doubt I’m correct in my assumption.
Best is if you can provide a sample file so we can see exactly what you are trying to do, makes it easier for all of us.
Br,
Anders
To filter for something that ends with use it like
="=* - xyproductname"
FYI, you are slightly mistaken in your belief that advanced filter generally looks for exact matches. For text values, it actually looks for anything beginning with your criterion unless you use a comparison operator like =, as Fluff suggested.
