need query 1: How many characters in a text field? If >4 need to trim or truncate.i

[SEPIA]

Novice 1st post: I am trying to support a nonprofit's Access DB. Need advice on how to write criteria to find records in a table with a text field called "MtngType" with more than 4 characters. I will then need to trim or truncate that field in those records.

[orange]

Actually you'll need to keep a column with MtngType and no criteria to get the field values returned.
You need a column like your current MtngType but
Use Len(MtngType) in place of MtngType and no quotes around the 4.

[June7]

Do you really want to change the data in table? A query can retrieve the first 4 letters without changing the data.

Left([MtngType],4)

If you really want to change data, that would be an UPDATE query.

UPDATE tablename SET MtngType=Left([MtngType],4);

[SEPIA]

Thank you Orange for your response. I am trying to determine how many records have more than 4 characters in that field.

[SEPIA]

Hi June7. I did not make my post clear. I need to know how many and which records contain a character length greater than 4.
After determining which and how many records and which records are involved I will run the update query.

[SEPIA]

June7,
I am not confident that I know how to identify which tables contain the confidential data, nor how to remove the confidential data tables. I do not have the right to release the database.
Both simple queries as suggested by you and Orange worked to give me records that seem to contain 4 or less characters in the field. I do not know how to modify the left function or the len function to return records with more than 4 characters.
Thanks

[June7]

Orange has given you the method to return records with more than 4 characters. Create a field in query with expression: Len([MtngType])

And apply filter criteria under that constructed field: >4

[SEPIA]

Thank you both. Problem solved. There were few enough records that a manual update rather than an update query will work for us.