Converting Other Data Types to String Data

First, keep in mind that the formatting functions I introduced you to in the previous section will return a string value. So, if you use something like this:

Dim iNumber, sString

iNumber = 5

sString = FormatPercent(iNumber, 2)

MsgBox sString

variable sString will contain a string value, because that's what FormatPercent() returns. Technically, the formatting functions are a sort of specialized string conversion function, too.

Dim dDate, sString

VBScript does provide a general string conversion function: CStr(). This function simply takes any type of data-numeric, date/time, currency, or whatever-and converts it to a string. The function works by taking each character of the input data and appending it to an output string. So the number 5 will become "5," the number -2 will become "-2," and so forth. Dates and times are converted to their short display format. For example, try running this.

dDate = Date()

sString = CStr(dDate)

MsgBox sString

The result should be a short formatted date, such as "5/26/2003."