Pull Distinct Values from concatenated column

[bhanes22]

I have this column in my table called specifications and it is set up so that each specification is delimited by a comma so it might be set up like so: 

SpecA,SpecB,SpecD

SpecB,SpecX,SpecD,

SpecY,SpecA,SpecB

etc. 

What I want is to transform this or create another column that gives me one one instance of each spec, so like: 

Spec A

Spec B

Spec C

Spec D

... and so on

I'm like 99% sure this can be done, and I even did it before apparentally but now for some reason in query editor its throwing an error so maybe I did it wrong? Idk what's going on with this column on my end, but it would be nice to see how someone more versed with Bi would accomplish this 

[Anonymous]

Hi @bhanes22,

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Regards,

Xiaoxin Sheng

[selimovd · Accepted solution]

Hey @bhanes22 ,

yes, that's possible in Power Query. For that go to Transform --> Split Column and in the advanced options choose "Rows":

Afterwards you have to remove the duplicates and then the data is like you wanted:

This here was my example:

let
    Source = Table.FromRows(Json.Document(Binary.Decompress(Binary.FromText("i45WCi5ITXbUAZFOYNJFKVYHIgrhR6CJRuog6VCKjQUA", BinaryEncoding.Base64), Compression.Deflate)), let _t = ((type nullable text) meta [Serialized.Text = true]) in type table [Specs = _t]),
    #"Changed Type" = Table.TransformColumnTypes(Source,{{"Specs", type text}}),
    #"Split Column by Delimiter" = Table.ExpandListColumn(Table.TransformColumns(#"Changed Type", {{"Specs", Splitter.SplitTextByDelimiter(",", QuoteStyle.Csv), let itemType = (type nullable text) meta [Serialized.Text = true] in type {itemType}}}), "Specs"),
    #"Removed Duplicates" = Table.Distinct(#"Split Column by Delimiter")
in
    #"Removed Duplicates"

If you need any help please let me know.

If I answered your question I would be happy if you could mark my post as a solution ✔️ and give it a thumbs up 👍

Best regards

Denis

Blog: WhatTheFact.bi

Follow me: twitter.com/DenSelimovic