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Concept visual
Start at both ends
Extract a substring from a string (start at position 1, extract 3 characters):
SELECT SUBSTRING("SQL Tutorial", 1, 3) AS ExtractString;The SUBSTRING() function extracts a substring from a string (starting at any position).
The position of the first character in the string is 1.
10 11 12 S Q L T u t o r i a l
Formula
The position of the last character in the string is - 1.-12 -11 -10 -9 -8 -7 -6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 S Q L T u t o r i a l
and
functions equals to the SUBSTRING() function.
string, start, length )
string
start
length )
Required. The string to extract from start Required. The start position. Can be both a positive or negative number. If it is a positive number, this function extracts from the beginning of the string. If it is a negative number, this function extracts from the end of the string. The position of the first character in the string is 1 and the position of the last character in the string is -1 length Optional. The number of characters to extract. If omitted, the whole string will be returned (from the start position)
From MySQL 4.0
Extract a substring from the text in a column (start at position 2, extract 5 characters): SELECT SUBSTRING(CustomerName, 2, 5) AS ExtractString
FROM Customers;Formula
Extract a substring from a string (start from the end, at position - 5, extractcharacters):
SELECT SUBSTRING("SQL Tutorial", -5, 5) AS ExtractString;❮ MySQL Functions