vb6visual-studio-6

Find text in VB6 IDE at the beginning of a line


I am trying to search a large VB6 project for where a variable gets assigned. If I just use the Find dialog and enter the variable name in the “Find What” textbox, it opens many windows where the variable is used, but I would like to just get the lines where the variable is the first thing at the beginning of a line (where the variable is being assigned to).

I have tried using the “Use Pattern Matching” option, but I must not be using it correctly; when I search VB6 Help, it just says that option searches using pattern matching characters, without mentioning what "pattern matching characters" are allowed.


Solution

  • A solution that uses the VB6 editor using the VB6 Find dialog with the "Use Pattern Matching" option, to find lines where an assignment to a variable is made is:

    yourVariableName*=
    

    where the wildcard pattern matching character is used. It doesn't actually require the variable name to be at the start of a line, and may give some extra hits, but is simple and easy to use within the VB6 code editor.