Filter Data using wildcards

A

alexlush

I'm trying to filter some data in Excel 97 to only view rows where the
description starts with two question marks (eg. ??item1, ??item2 etc).

I set up a custom filter with the drop down box set to 'begins with'
and the value set to ?? (see attached file) but excel treats question
marks as wildcards and thinks the question marks represent any single
character.

Any idea how to force it to recognise wildcards as actual characters?

I presume the same problem occurs if trying to search using the
asterisk symbol.

Thanks

Al

File Attached: http://www.exceltip.com/forum/attachment.php?postid=262837 (filter.jpg)
 
A

Anon

alexlush said:
I'm trying to filter some data in Excel 97 to only view rows where the
description starts with two question marks (eg. ??item1, ??item2 etc).

I set up a custom filter with the drop down box set to 'begins with'
and the value set to ?? (see attached file) but excel treats question
marks as wildcards and thinks the question marks represent any single
character.

Any idea how to force it to recognise wildcards as actual characters?

I presume the same problem occurs if trying to search using the
asterisk symbol.

Thanks

Al
Click to expand...

To make Excel treat the ? (or *) character as a literal character rather
than a wildcard, precede it with the ~ character. Thus, your filter will
need to 'begin with' ~?~? rather than ??.
 
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