Why is

INSTR({name},":")

an invalid formula?

AI generated answer (using internal Slack threads):

The formula

INSTR({name},":")

is invalid because the

INSTR

function in NetSuite's SQL implementation expects two string arguments. The first argument is the string to be searched, and the second argument is the substring to search for. In the formula

INSTR({name},":")

,

{name}

is a placeholder for a field value, which may not always be a string. If the

{name}

field contains non-string data, the

INSTR

function will fail because it cannot search within non-string data. Additionally, the

INSTR

function returns the position of the first occurrence of the substring within the string, starting from position 1. If the substring is not found, the function returns 0. This means that the formula

INSTR({name},":")

will return a number, not a boolean value. If you are using this formula in a context where a boolean value is expected (such as a condition in a

CASE

statement), it will not work as expected. If you want to check if a string field contains a specific substring, you can use the

LIKE

operator instead. For example, the formula

{name} LIKE '%:%'

will return true if the

{name}

field contains a colon anywhere in its value. ****** Disclaimer: This response was generated by an artificial intelligence assistant based on previous conversations from multiple Slack channels, and may contain inaccuracies or mistakes. ******