VERIFY

returns a number that, by default, indicates whether string is composed only of characters from reference; returns 0 if all characters in string are in reference, or returns the position of the first character in string not in reference.

The option can be either Nomatch (the default) or Match. (Only the capitalized and highlighted letter is needed. All characters following it are ignored, and it can be in upper- or lowercase, as usual.) If you specify Match, the function returns the position of the first character in string that is in reference, or returns 0 if none of the characters are found.

The default for start is 1; thus, the search starts at the first character of string. You can override this by specifying a different start point, which must be a positive whole number.

If string is null, the function returns 0, regardless of the value of the third argument. Similarly, if start is greater than LENGTH(string), the function returns 0. If reference is null, the function returns 0 if you specify Match; otherwise the function returns the start value.

Here are some examples:

VERIFY('123','1234567890')             ->    0
VERIFY('1Z3','1234567890')             ->    2
VERIFY('AB4T','1234567890')            ->    1
VERIFY('AB4T','1234567890','M')        ->    3
VERIFY('AB4T','1234567890','N')        ->    1
VERIFY('1P3Q4','1234567890',,3)        ->    4
VERIFY('123','',N,2)                   ->    2
VERIFY('ABCDE','',,3)                  ->    3
VERIFY('AB3CD5','1234567890','M',4)    ->    6