Function that returns a part of a comma-separated string

Whenever you need to to handle comma-separated string, you might want to check the function below, which makes use of VFP's ALINES() function to return a certain value in the string.


* Parameters: String (character) , which part (numeric), delimiter (character)
PARAMETERS cCsv, nPart, pdelimiter

IF PCOUNT() < 3
pDelimiter = ","
ENDIF

cCsv = STRTRAN(cCsv, pDelimiter, " "+CHR(13) )

ALINES(aCsv, cCsv , .T.)

* When array element 1 = .False. => return ""
* When the number of array elements < nPart => return ""
* Otherwise, return the piece of the string

RETURN IIF( TYPE( "aCsv[1]" ) = "L" , "", IIF( ALEN(aCsv,1) < nPart , "", aCsv[nPart] ) )