# Is a character a member of an vector
**URL:** https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634
**Category:** New to Julia
**Created:** [October 5, 2023, 9:44pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634 "2023-10-05T21:44:41Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@neophytedave](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/neophytedave)
#### Post date: [October 5, 2023, 9:44pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634/1 "2023-10-05T21:44:41Z")
the subject line says it all. I can laboriously loop through the array. However, I am wondering if there is not a function which will do this more elegantly.
---
### Author:  [@Benny](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Benny)
#### Post date: [October 5, 2023, 9:53pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634/2 "2023-10-05T21:53:22Z")
I don’t understand the subject line, just looking at it I’m imagining `Vector{Char}` but you’re saying you don’t want to loop through an array but you want a function that does? So `map`, broadcasting, or other such higher order functions? I don’t understand that either because you don’t really save much effort there either, you’d still have to write out what each iteration does.
---
### Author:  [@mikmoore](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/mikmoore)
#### Post date: [October 5, 2023, 10:06pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634/3 "2023-10-05T22:06:26Z")
```julia
julia> in('b', 'a':'f')
true
julia> in('z', 'a':'f')
false
```
Any other haystack of `Char` would work in place of the `'a':'f'` I used. That said, unless it can exploit some particular organization (like that the haystack is a range, like I used here), it will just do the looping you mention internally. If your haystack is sorted, you can at least consider the `insorted` function.
---
### Author:  [@frylock](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/frylock)
#### Post date: [October 6, 2023, 1:06pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634/4 "2023-10-06T13:06:01Z")
This is not different from mikmoore’s solution, but in the REPL you can use the `\in` tab complete to write the same function as an infix operator (i.e. you type “\in\” and the REPL transforms that text to “∈”):
```julia
In [1]: 'e' ∈ "needle"
Out[1]: true
```
Frankly, one of my favorite features of the REPL.
---
### Author:  [@CameronBieganek](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/CameronBieganek)
#### Post date: [October 6, 2023, 2:14pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634/5 "2023-10-06T14:14:45Z")
For completeness, you can also just use `in` as an infix operator:
```julia
'e' in "needle"
```
---
### Author:  [@neophytedave](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/neophytedave)
#### Post date: [October 25, 2023, 8:14pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/is-a-character-a-member-of-an-vector/104634/6 "2023-10-25T20:14:38Z")
The subject line was possibly (very) badly written, possibly because I had not thought through what I wanted to do. Be that as it may, the question was answered. Thank you to all.