Joining long line in VB with " & _"

[Tinkerz]

what is the correct way to join long lines of code in VB with & _
I have a very long statment and need to check what is correct do I need "statement" & _
"statement"?

EDIT: removed SQL statment - it was blowing the page out of proportion - Moderator

 

[Norie]

Tinkerz

You could use the line continuation character _ but since what you are constructing is a string I would suggest another method.

EDIT: removed SQL statment - it was blowing the page out of proportion - Moderator

Note this could probably be split up even more, I'm just basing it on your posted code.

 

[Tinkerz]

Thanks that is a great help and i will use that

but what is &_ and the rules from that any example would be great

 

[Smitty]

Use the Line-Continuation Character - As you have probably noticed, the Module Window does not have a word-wrapping feature. If you enter a very long statement, you can wrap the statement yourself by use of the line-continuation character wich consists of a space followed by an underscore ( _). If you don't break a long line with this character, you will need to use the horizontal scrollbars to view parts of the statement. You can't use the line-continuation character to wrap a string expression to another line; instead, you can divide the string into smaller pieces and concatenate the pieces.

Code: ( text )
Dim strMsg As String
'Instead of this
'strMsg = "The rules of Referential Integrity have been violated. You have made an attempt to enter a Training Record for an Employee in the Training Table when this individual doesn't exist in the Parent (Employees) Table. Enter a valid Employee Record first, then proceed"

'Use this syntax
strMsg = "The rules of Referential Integrity have been violated. You have made an " & _
"attempt to enter a Training Record for an Employee in the Training Table " & _
"when this individual doesn't exist in the Parent (Employees) Table. Enter " & _
"a valid Employee Record first, then proceed"

MsgBox strMsg, vbExclamation, "Referential Integrity Violation"

From: A 6-Pack of Good Programming Style Hints

And here's a great post dealing specifically with long SQL statements

HTH,

Smitty