I have a text box for dates. I don't care if the date is in the "mm/dd/yyyy" format, or the "m/d/yy" format.

I do not want to use the Short Date Input Mask Property for the text box...takes too long for data entry.

I thought that I would use the BeforeUpdate event to capture the string that was entered by the user.

What I would like to do is to count the number of times that the date separator "/" is found in that string. If that character shows up twice in that string, then I have a good date. If the character only shows up once, then the user entered "m/yyyy" or some other variation.

What would be the code that I could use to return the number of times that a specific character is used in a string?

Thanks for your help.

Hi,
why not use a calendar control to pick the date. Probably pretty fast and there will be no ambiguity. There are so many different ways the user could screw up which your code would probably not cover.
HTH
Good luck

Thank you for the idea...but I'm also going to limit the date to no further back than 16 days.



Could also use the DateDiff function

But, I don't know how to make a calendar control limit the time period to only 16 days.

Thanks,

Evaluate the selection the user makes...and give feedback based on that. The user could still enter a value outside of the 1 days, too so why not let them select it.
HTH
Good luck

Just strange how typing 050408 with an input mask is harder than typing 5/4/08 (same number of characters.

use an input mask of

09/09/0099;;_

and it makes it really quick as you don't need the optional (9) digits.

I went with the input mask...and I really appreciate help from both. Thank you so much.