Final answer:
To extract text from Excel before a specific character, combine the LEFT and FIND functions in a formula.
Step-by-step explanation:
To extract text from a cell in Excel before a specific character, you can use the LEFT and FIND functions together. For example, if you want to extract everything before the hyphen in the text '12345-6789' in cell A1, you can use the formula =LEFT(A1, FIND("-", A1)-1).
The FIND function locates the character, and LEFT returns the text before it. Subtract 1 to exclude the character itself from the result. This formula uses the FIND function to locate the position of the hyphen and then the LEFT function to return all characters before that position.
Make sure you subtract 1 from the result of FIND to exclude the character itself from the result. This method is practical for various data analysis tasks or when organizing spreadsheet data.