Cell value string to Int in OpenOffice Calc?

Question

I have "1 hour", "2 hours", in a column in Calc, and I would like to extract the numbers only. I've tried VALUE(A9), but it doesn't work.

Answer 1

This is an Excel solution but my understanding is that Calc supports most Excel functions.

If your number always appears at the beginning of a text string and is followed by at least one space, then:

=VALUE(LEFT(A1,SEARCH(" ",A1)-1))

will extract the value from such a string in cell A1.