this is all within one field, but there are multiple sentences within that one field, which i am trying to link to values in another field.

Kev you've been brilliant in spending your efforts for me, so no need to apologise and thanks for the help so far.

What I tried to do as a work around is use multiple 'if' statements with your formula;

if {F_TASK.TASK_QUESTIONS} LIKE "*01A*" then
mid({F_TASK.TASK.NOTES},instr({F_TASK.TASK.NOTES},"01A-"),length({F_TASK.TASK.NOTES})) else
if {F_TASK.TASK_QUESTIONS} LIKE "*01B*" then
mid({F_TASK.TASK.NOTES},instr({F_TASK.TASK.NOTES},"01B-"),length({F_TASK.TASK.NOTES})) else..... and so on so forth.

Problem with this is that I can only use this as long as i don't have the 'can grow' option ticked, which will cut subsequent sentences off, and only if they are short single line sentences. Also, the formula only works if there are sentences in {F_TASK.TASK.NOTES} that contain the codes stated in the formula, if there isn't, i get a validation error along the lines of 'this is not an integer' or something similar. My guess is that I haven't defined what the formula should do if these items are not present - I have no idea how to close multiple 'if' statements and tried 'end if', but this didn't work.

Anyway thanks all the same!

Edited by siguy - 10 Jun 2013 at 11:08am