Using Calc for existing records

[mike winter]

Hi, I am a newby so please forgive. I have one field called ‘contact’ which has both Christian and Surname, and want to show the Christian name only, as a separate field on the same form. If I use calc for the Christian name it works fine for a new record, but not for existing records. How can I update all the records? Many thanks in advance.

[Tricky]

What would be a better approach is to create separate fields for entries of Christian and Surname and use a calc for those cases where you need to show them together.

[mike winter]

Thanks for replying. I agree. But how to show for all existing records?

[Inky Phil]

Hi

Try this

create two new fields cname and surname

Go to a layout with both of these fields on them.

Put your cursor in the first one and use the replace field contents (under the records menu) and replace it with Leftwords(contact;1)

Do the same for field 2 and replace it with Rightwords(contact;1)

I haven't tried this but in theory it should give you 2 new fields with the surname and christian name split accordingly.

You can then change your existing contact field to be a calc field, unstored cname &" "&surname

HTH

Phil

[mike winter]

Thanks Phil, it works a treat. Just what I was looking for.