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The POSIT function finds the starting position of a substring within a larger string. For example, the starting position of the substring DUCT in the string PRODUCTION is four. If the substring is not in the parent string, the function returns the value 0.
There is a version of the POSIT function that is available only in the Maintain language. For information on this function, see POSIT: Finding the Beginning of a Substring (Maintain).
POSIT(parent, inlength, substring, sublength, outfield)
where:
Alphanumeric
Is the parent character string enclosed in single quotation marks, or a field or variable that contains the parent character string.
Integer
Is the length of the parent character string in characters, or a field that contains the length. If this argument is less than or equal to 0, the function returns a 0.
Alphanumeric
Is the substring whose position you want to find. This can be the substring enclosed in single quotation marks, or the field that contains the string.
Integer
Is the length of substring. If this argument is less than or equal to 0, or if it is greater than inlength, the function returns a 0.
Integer
Is the name of the field that contains the result, or the format of the output value enclosed in single quotation marks.
POSIT determines the position of the first capital letter I in LAST_NAME and stores the result in I_IN_NAME:
TABLE FILE EMPLOYEE
PRINT LAST_NAME AND COMPUTE
I_IN_NAME/I2 = POSIT(LAST_NAME, 15, 'I', 1, 'I2');
WHERE DEPARTMENT EQ 'PRODUCTION'
ENDThe output is:
LAST_NAME I_IN_NAME --------- --------- STEVENS 0 SMITH 3 BANNING 5 IRVING 1 ROMANS 0 MCKNIGHT 5
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