blocking items dependent on words within a field

I am sitting here with both my Crystal 8.5 and my SQL guides out and still can not find the answers I am looking for...

I know that if I want to block an item that starts with a certain phrase I can use the code
Code:
------------------------

not({item.itm_desc} startswith ["cement","interpore","collagraft","mesh"])
------------------------
... however, my problem is that the items that I want to block do not START the description... the words are within the description - just not at the beginning of it . I know it is still possible to block items based on those words, but I can not remember how to code the report to do so...

Also - just to make life a little more interesting - there is 1 item that begins with the word "mesh" that i DO want to show up on this report. is there coding that says something to the effect of "ignore all items beginning with "mesh" EXCEPT item # 54446" ?

Does anyone have any ideas? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated...i just wanted to let yall know someone gave me the following suggestion in regard to the second question and it worked great:
Code:
------------------------

If {Item_no}="54446" then {item.itm_desc}={item.itm_desc} elsenot({item.itm_desc}startswith "mesh")
------------------------

i am still searching for the first answer, but at least the second one has been put to rest...

thanks

Blank space

Hi I am trying to remove the space between the words to make it one single
word.
ETK SETTLEM ESCROW ACCOUNT
I used this command: REPLACE(String,' ','')
Thank you for any helpHi,
This should work
declare @.s varchar(50)
Set @.s = 'ETK SETTLEM ESCROW ACCOUNT'
Set @.s = REPLACE(@.s,' ','')
select @.s
Maybe your syntax was incorrect
Thanks
Barry|||> I used this command: REPLACE(String,' ','')
And what happened? The syntax looks correct, but incomplete. Are you
trying to update the data in a table, or just select it without the spaces?
Give some more information other than "I did this"...