Try this:

This formula returns 1 if cell A1 contains the word "shell"
=COUNTIF(A1,"*shell*")

This formula counts the number of cells in the range A1:A10 that contain the
word "shell":
=COUNTIF(A1:A10,"*shell*")

Note: COUNTIF is not case sensitive.

Does that help?
***********
Regards,
Ron

XL2002, WinXP


"MKB" wrote:

Is there an easy way to test the contents of a cell for a particular
character string? I have a number of records that I've dumped out of an
AS400 application and need to search one column for the word "Shell". The
word is only part of the cell contents and is a varying number of spaces from
the beginning or end of each respective character string.