INDEX function

Returns an INTEGER value that indicates the position of the target string within the source string.

Syntax 

 

INDEX ( source , target [ , starting ] )

source

A CHARACTER or LONGCHAR expression.

target

A CHARACTER or LONGCHAR expression whose position you want to locate in source. If target does not exist within source, INDEX returns a 0.

starting

An integer that specifies at which left-most position in the string to start the search. For example, INDEX("abcdefabcdef","abc",6) returns 7.

Examples 

For this example, you must enter 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5. The INDEX function checks if the digit exists in the string "12345".

 

r-index.p

DEFINE VARIABLE x    AS CHARACTER NO-UNDO FORMAT "9"   LABEL "Enter a digit between 1 and 5". DEFINE VARIABLE show AS CHARACTER NO-UNDO FORMAT "x(5)" EXTENT 5   LABEL "Literal" INITIAL ["One", "Two", "Three", "Four", "Five"].   REPEAT:   SET x AUTO-RETURN.   IF INDEX("12345",x) = 0 THEN DO:     MESSAGE "Digit must be 1,2,3,4, or 5. Try again.".     UNDO, RETRY.   END.   ELSE DISPLAY show[INTEGER(x)]. END.

This procedure also uses the starting option:

 

r-index2.p

DEFINE VARIABLE positions AS CHARACTER NO-UNDO FORMAT "x(60)". DEFINE VARIABLE sentence  AS CHARACTER NO-UNDO FORMAT "x(72)". DEFINE VARIABLE vowel     AS CHARACTER NO-UNDO FORMAT "x". DEFINE VARIABLE found     AS INTEGER   NO-UNDO. DEFINE VARIABLE loop     AS INTEGER   NO-UNDO. DEFINE VARIABLE start     AS INTEGER   NO-UNDO.   FORM sentence LABEL "Type in a sentence" WITH FRAME top TITLE "This program will tell where the vowels are in a sentence.".   SET sentence WITH FRAME top. DO loop = 1 TO 5:   ASSIGN     positions = ""     vowel     = SUBSTRING("aeiou",loop,1)     start     = 1     found     = INDEX(sentence,vowel,start).   DO WHILE found > 0:     ASSIGN       positions = positions + STRING(found) + " "       start     = found + 1       found     = INDEX(sentence,vowel,start). END. DISPLAY vowel LABEL "Vowel" positions LABEL "Is found at locations..."     WITH 5 DOWN. DOWN. END.

Notes 

If either operand is case sensitive, then the search is case sensitive.

If the target string is null, the result is 0.

The INDEX function is double-byte enabled. You can specify target and source strings for the INDEX function that contain double-byte characters.

See also 

LOOKUP function, R-INDEX function