Need Help Adding a Field

[shaboyagan]

I am very new here. Please forgive me if this is not the right place to post this. I have a mailing list database in Filemaker 7. I have had it for some time and now I need to make one change and I am hoping there is a simple way to do it.

In this database I have one field for "First Name" and one field for "Last Name" In the "First Name" field I have always just put the title in there as well. Like Mr. or Mrs. or Rev. etc. Well I want to set up some letters to use mail merge and the way my database is now if I select the "First Name" field to begin a letter it would put Dear Mr. Bob instead of Dear Bob. I need to create a new "Title" field and separate the titles from the first names in the current "First Name" field.

My database has over 3,000 contacts and I am really hoping there is a simple or automated way to do this.

Thank you very much for any help!

[mz123]

I highly HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend backing up before doing this, in case something goes wrong:

You are making changes to all records in the found set with the following Replace function. You may want to have only one record in your found set to test the replace functions to make sure they work.

Assuming all of your titles have a period before them (Mr., Dr., Mrs., etc.) you can create a new field called "Title" Then add the field to the layout. Go to Record > Replace Field Contents....

Select "Replace With Calculated Result" and enter the following calc:

Let(

[

name = FirstName //Select your first name field here

txt = LeftWords( name ; 1 ) ;

len = length( txt ) ;

newtxt = if( middle( name ; len + 1 ) = "." ; left( name ; len+1) ; "" )];

newtxt

)

Then Click OK and Replace.

Once that's done go to the field "First Name" and go to Records > Replace Field Contents...

Select "Replace With Calculated Result" and select

Trim( Substitute( First Name ; Title ; ""))

Click OK and Replace.

That should do it.

let me know if you need more help or if you want me to break it down for you :P

Edited December 4, 2008 by Guest

[Lee Smith]

Hi shaboyagan, and welcome to the Forum,

If you were to do a search of the Forum for Parse, Extract, Full Name, Whole Name, etc., you would find a LOT of post on this topic.

Take a look at this topic, and I think you will find what you are needing. Link

HTH

Lee