Extracting Part of a Field

[The Professor]

Hello,

I'm wanting to know if I can, within a query, extract only part of a field.

The reason is, I'm doing a mail merge, using an Access Query as a source. However the clients names are held within the database in full, ie - "David John Brown" but in places, within the letter, I only want to use the first name, "David" and not the rest. How, within the Query, can I extract just the first name, is this possible?

Prof.

[pbaldy]

You can combine the Left() function with InStr() to find the first space.

[The Professor]

Hello Paul,

Thank you for your speedy reply - appreciated.
I understand in principle what you mean, but would you be able to post a simple example of what that might look like in practice? I suppose what I'm asking is, could you 'draw me a diagram' as it were?

Prof.

[pbaldy]

You're a professor and I have to draw a diagram?!?

Left(FieldName, InStr(...))

[The Professor]

[QUOTE=pbaldy;296024]You're a professor and I have to draw a diagram?!?

Yes, yes - I wondered how long it would be before someone cracked that particular joke. But, then again, being a professor means I can understand very complex diagrams! Anyway thank you for that and I shall now go away and study your very helpful and detailed diagram.

Prof.

[pbaldy]

Detailed? I tried not to be too detailed. I was going for the "Teach how to fish" level of detail.

Post back if you get stuck.