sorting a list by first rows value equal to a specific character

**simone77** · 11-09-2011, 06:22 AM

Hi,

Sorry for the very long title but I can't find a more synthetic way to say it.
I have a list like that in the attachment (much longer than that). The list represent the capture history of animals.
The first column represents the names of the individuals and the next 9 columns are the encounter history of that individual (D means found as "Diseased", H found as "Healthy", U found as "Unknown state", 0 means that it has not been captured).
I want to find a subset of this list that is formed by those individuals whose first encounter (no zero value) was a D (after will do the same with H).
I thought that a convenient way would be to sort the list in some way for example by using VLOOKUP but I can't figure out how to do this.
Any idea on this?

Thanks for any help you might provide

Simone

**beaunydal** · 11-09-2011, 10:35 AM

Maybe with AutoFilter and a few helper columns.
See attachment where D, H or U can be selected from the Data Validation selection list in A1, then when the same condition code is selected in the column B AutoFilter only visible rows are the rows where that condition was recorded for the first capture.

Beau Nydal