thanks Harlan it works.
for that reason i placed a rephrased question in the forum + e.g.
thanks again


"Harlan Grove" wrote:

Nir wrote...
it is almost perfect with one exception. The strings i am looking for
contain various lengths. can you help me out with that too.

Always best to provide representative samples, e.g., looking for AAA,
BB or C in some string x in that order (return AAA first, then BB and
finally C).

=LOOKUP(1000000,SEARCH({"C","BB","AAA"},x),{"C","B B","AAA"})