How to remove spaces in between text?

Question

Why trim is not working in VBA?

for i = 3 to 2000
activesheet.cells(i,\"C\").value = trim(Activesheet.cells(i,\"C\").value)
next i

It is un

Answer 1

Are all your other functions leaving whitespace behind?

Get CleanUltra!

CleanUltra removes all whitespace and non-printable characters including whitespace left behind by other functions!

I hope you find this useful. Any improvements are welcome!

Function CleanUltra( _
       ByVal stringToClean As String, _
       Optional ByVal removeSpacesBetweenWords As Boolean = False) _
        As String
' Removes non-printable characters and whitespace from a string


' Remove the 1 character vbNullChar. This must be done first
'  if the string contains vbNullChar
    stringToClean = Replace(stringToClean, vbNullChar, vbNullString)

    ' Remove non-printable characters.
    stringToClean = Application.Clean(stringToClean)

    ' Remove all spaces except single spaces between words
    stringToClean = Application.Trim(stringToClean)

    If removeSpacesBetweenWords = True Then _
       stringToClean = Replace(stringToClean, " ", vbNullString)

    CleanUltra = stringToClean
End Function

Here's an example of it's usage:

Sub Example()
    Dim myVar As String
    myVar = " abc d e  "

    MsgBox CleanUltra(myVar)
End Sub

Here's a test I ran to verify that the function actually removed all whitespace. vbNullChar was particularly devious. I had to set the function to remove it first, before the CLEAN and TRIM functions were used to stop them from removing all characters after the vbNullChar.

Sub Example()
    Dim whitespaceSample As String
    Dim myVar As String

' Examples of various types of whitespace
'  (vbNullChar is particularly devious!)
    whitespaceSample = vbNewLine & _
                       vbCrLf & _
                       vbVerticalTab & _
                       vbFormFeed & _
                       vbCr & _
                       vbLf & _
                       vbNullChar

    myVar = "     1234" & _
            whitespaceSample & _
            "     56      " & _
            "789     "

    Debug.Print "ORIGINAL"
    Debug.Print myVar
    Debug.Print "Character Count: " & Len(myVar)


    Debug.Print
    Debug.Print "CLEANED, Option FALSE"


    Debug.Print CleanUltra(myVar)
    Debug.Print CleanUltra(myVar, False)
    '   Both of these perform the same action.  If the optional parameter to
    '   remove spaces between words is left blank it defaults to FALSE.
    '   Whitespace is removed but spaces between words are preserved.
    Debug.Print "Character Count: " & Len(CleanUltra(myVar))


    Debug.Print
    Debug.Print "CLEANED, Option TRUE"

    Debug.Print CleanUltra(myVar, True)
    '   Optional parameter to remove spaces between words is set to TRUE.
    '   Whitespace and all spaces between words are removed.
    Debug.Print "Character Count: " & Len(CleanUltra(myVar, True))

End Sub

Answer 2

My related issue was that the last character was a chr(160) - a non-breaking space. So trim(replace(Str,chr(160),"")) was the solution.

Answer 3

Trim removes extra spaces at start and end, not in the middle of a string.

Function CleanSpace(ByVal strIn As String) As String
    strIn = Trim(strIn)

  ' // Replace all double space pairings with single spaces
    Do While InStr(strIn, "  ")
        strIn = Replace(strIn, "  ", " ")
    Loop

    CleanSpace = strIn
End Function

From here.

PS. It's not the most efficient way to remove spaces. I wouldn't use on many, very long strings or in a tight loop. It might be suitable for your situation.

Answer 4

If You are familiar with collections, i once wrote a quick code that process the whole sheet even if it is huge and remove all double spaces, lead and trail spaces and invisible characters from all cells. Just take care it will remove the format of your text, i also did not do much testing and it's exhaustive but it worked for my short task and worked fast.

This is an Auxiliary function that loads the sheet into a collection

Function LoadInCol() As Collection

Dim currColl As Collection
Dim currColl2 As Collection

Set currColl = New Collection
Set currColl2 = New Collection

With ActiveSheet.UsedRange
    LastCol = .Columns(.Columns.Count).Column
    lastrow = .Rows(.Rows.Count).Row
End With

For i = 1 To lastrow

    For j = 1 To LastCol
        currColl.Add Cells(i, j).Value
    Next

    currColl2.Add currColl
    Set currColl = New Collection

Next

    Set LoadInCol = currColl2

End Function

And this is the main Sub that removes the spaces

Sub RemoveDSpaces()

'Removes double spaces from the whole sheet

Dim Col1 As Collection
Dim Col2 As Collection
Dim Col3 As Collection

Dim StrIn As String

Dim Count As Long

Set Col1 = New Collection
Set Col2 = New Collection
Set Col3 = New Collection


Set Col1 = LoadInCol()

Count = Col1.Count

i = 0

For Each Item In Col1

i = i + 1
If i >= Count + 1 Then Exit For

    Set Col2 = Item

    For Each Item2 In Col2

        StrIn = WorksheetFunction.Clean(Trim(Item2))

        Do Until InStr(1, StrIn, "  ", vbBinaryCompare) = 0
            StrIn = Replace(StrIn, "  ", Chr(32))
        Loop

        Col3.Add StrIn

    Next

Col1.Remove (1)
Col1.Add Col3
Set Col3 = New Collection

Next

'Store Results

Cells.ClearContents

    Z = 1
    m = 1
    Set Col3 = New Collection

    For Each Item In Col1

        Set Col3 = Item

            For Each Item2 In Col3
                Cells(Z, m) = Item2
                m = m + 1
            Next

            m = 1
            Z = Z + 1

    Next

End Sub