Hi,

 

I need to be able to take a serial number field and convert to text. 

like this:   1 = A, 2 = B, 25 = Z, 26 = AA, 27 = BB etc.

 

I did try to use a custom function on brian dunnings website ( http://www.briandunning.com/cf/399 ) but for some reason when I try to save the function Filemaker says "An operator (e.g. +, -, *, ...) is expected here"

and it flags the bracket as shown in red below in the code.

 

 

 

/*

DecToAlpha function

 

Author

*COMMENT Visual Realisation

 

Format

DecToAlpha ( decimal ) 

 

Parameters

decimal - any numeric expression or field containing a non-negative numeric expression.

NOTE: Only the integer part of decimal will be considered.

 

Data type returned

text

 

Description

Returns the representation of a decimal number as a variable-length alphabetic text string.

 

January 18, 2006

*/

 

Let ( [

alpha = "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ" ;

base = Length ( alpha ) ;

bit = Mod ( decimal ; base ) ;

char = Middle ( alpha ; bit + 1 ; 1 ) ;

next = Div ( decimal ; base )

] ;

Case ( next ; DecToAlpha ( next - 1 ) ) & char

)

 

Are you sure that what you pasted here is what you used when trying to create the CF? I copied the text from your post, created a CF from it, and it works as advertised.

 

The only things I can think of are a wrong function name (it's recursive, so that must match the name in the calculation), or a missing or misnamed parameter, but both those errors bring up other messages.

Here is a small sample file showing two of the CFs that do this.

 

I forgot to mention, you can copy the CFs from the file into your  by pasting them into your Custom Function Dialog box (File >> Manage >> Custom Functions)

skearton.fmp12.zip

Thanks Lee for the file that helps! 

 

My problem was I was giving the function name this: "DecToAlpha function"

and it had to be just "DecToAlpha".

 

Thanks to you all for the quick help!