Solving Anagrams with Access

[ronymaxwell]

I have a crossword solver which uses 'Like' to search a word list for matches to inputs with wildcards. I want to add an anagram solver but can't see a way to do it. I've got close by manipulating strings but can't quite manage it. Any ideas?

[June7]

Google: VB anagram solver

I bet someone has already done this and posted code somewhere.

[ronymaxwell]

Google: VB anagram solver

I bet someone has already done this and posted code somewhere.

I've already done that. There are plenty of standalone downloads and one for Excel, but nothing in Access. Couldn't even find anything in VBA.

I've tried populating a table with words of the required length using [code>] DoCmd.RunSQL "INSERT INTO tempTable(tempWord) SELECT fWord FROM wordList WHERE Len(fWord) = " & L & ";" [<code] where L is the word length and fWord the field containing dictionary words.

I then deleted words which didn't have the letters in the searched word in them using [code>] DoCmd.RunSQL "DELETE * FROM tempTable WHERE Mid$(tempWord, " & i & ", 1) Like " & Chr$(34) & "[!" & s & "]" & Chr$(34) & ";" [<code] where s is the inputted search word as a string. I repeated this for each letter.

This almost works, but it can't handle words with more than one instance of any particular letter. For instance searching for anagrams of 'SAPS' gives 'ASPS', 'PASS' and 'SPAS' but also 'PAPA', 'PAPS' and 'SASS'. I've thought of going through all the possible combinations of the word before searching the word list, but as the words grow in length, this would be huge.

I have now added a further step. [code>] DoCmd.RunSQL "DELETE * FROM tempTable WHERE Instr(1, tempWord, '" & r & "', 1) = 0;" [<code]. This is repeated for each letter where r is the individual letter in the searched word. It gets rid of 'PAPA' and 'SASS' in the above example but not 'PAPS'.

[June7]

Also, count each letter in SAPS and if that count not found in the candidate match, remove it.

I Googled: VB anagram solver

Look at this thread http://www.vbdotnetforums.com/window...lp-please.html

Then I Googled: VBA array.sort

Review http://www.cpearson.com/excel/SortingArrays.aspx

[ronymaxwell]

Also, count each letter in SAPS and if that count not found in the candidate match, remove it.

I Googled: VB anagram solver

Look at this thread http://www.vbdotnetforums.com/window...lp-please.html

Then I Googled: VBA array.sort

Review http://www.cpearson.com/excel/SortingArrays.aspx

Super Moderator, thank you. The QSortInPlace is just what I need. I'd already found the first link but didn't want to use Excel, similar for the first option on the second link, but the second option is perfect.

[June7]

Even though code may be written with Excel in mind, can sometimes be adapted to Access. I didn't look at the referenced code in depth but that has helped me get code ideas before.

[ronymaxwell]

Even though code may be written with Excel in mind, can sometimes be adapted to Access. I didn't look at the referenced code in depth but that has helped me get code ideas before.

I couldn't find anything like 'array.sort' in Access. I'm happy though with the solution, thanks.