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Focal Point    Focal Point Forums  Hop To Forum Categories  WebFOCUS/FOCUS Forum on Focal Point     [SOLVED] Best way to remove alpha characters from alphanumeric fields

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[SOLVED] Best way to remove alpha characters from alphanumeric fields
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kadkins
Silver Member
posted
I have a field (A22 format) which can contain a series of either numbers or letters. What is the best method to remove all occurances of alpha characters from the field so that only numbers are remaining? The letters may occur in any positions within the field: (ex - 123AA or AA123 or 1A2A3).

Thanks in advance.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Kerry,


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Posts: 31 | Registered: September 29, 2010Report This Post
Francis Mariani
Expert
posted Hide Post
Take a look at this post, SQL Code conversion in Focus for an example of a DEFINE FUNCTION that does what you require.


Francis


Give me code, or give me retirement. In FOCUS since 1991

Production: WF 7.7.05M, Dev Studio, BID, MRE, WebSphere, DB2 / Test: WF 8.1.05M, App Studio, BI Portal, Report Caster, jQuery, HighCharts, Apache Tomcat, MS SQL Server
 
Posts: 10577 | Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada | Registered: April 27, 2005Report This Post
kadkins
Silver Member
posted Hide Post
Thx Francis. I was looking for a method similar to using regular expressions within FOCUS. I'll check it out.


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Posts: 31 | Registered: September 29, 2010Report This Post
Francis Mariani
Expert
posted Hide Post
As far as I know, there are no regular expressions, but there are many ways to do something.

Here's another way, using three built-in functions, PATTERN, STRREP and EDIT. Note this will only work if the column contains only alpha or numeric characters - PATTERN leaves special characters untouched.

TABLE FILE EMPDATA
PRINT 
JOBCLASS
COMPUTE JPATTERN1/A8 = PATTERN(8, JOBCLASS, 'A8');
COMPUTE JPATTERN2/A8 = STRREP(8, JPATTERN1, 1, 'A', 1, '$', 8, 'A8');
COMPUTE JNUM/A8 = EDIT(JOBCLASS,JPATTERN2);
END
I've left out the NOPRINT for JPATTERN1 and JPATTERN2 so you can see the transformations. First I use PATTERN to determine where the alpha and numeric characters are. Then I use STRREP to replace the 'A' (for alpha) by '$'. Then I use EDIT to extract the numeric characters ('$' is a mask character which excludes the alpha characters). Pretty nifty until someone comes up with a better idea.


Francis


Give me code, or give me retirement. In FOCUS since 1991

Production: WF 7.7.05M, Dev Studio, BID, MRE, WebSphere, DB2 / Test: WF 8.1.05M, App Studio, BI Portal, Report Caster, jQuery, HighCharts, Apache Tomcat, MS SQL Server
 
Posts: 10577 | Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada | Registered: April 27, 2005Report This Post
Waz
Expert
posted Hide Post
Awesone solution Francis.

Good One


Waz...

Prod:WebFOCUS 7.6.10/8.1.04Upgrade:WebFOCUS 8.2.07OS:LinuxOutputs:HTML, PDF, Excel, PPT
In Focus since 1984
Pity the lost knowledge of an old programmer!

 
Posts: 6347 | Location: 33°49'23.0"S, 151°11'41.0"E | Registered: October 31, 2006Report This Post
kadkins
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posted Hide Post
Agreed. Awesome solution. Thanks!


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Posts: 31 | Registered: September 29, 2010Report This Post
Doug
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Ditto Good One Clever use of WebFOCUS! and outside the box.
 
Posts: 3132 | Location: Tennessee, Nashville area | Registered: February 23, 2005Report This Post
Waz
Expert
posted Hide Post
I think this is an excellent example of WebFOCUS capabilities.


Waz...

Prod:WebFOCUS 7.6.10/8.1.04Upgrade:WebFOCUS 8.2.07OS:LinuxOutputs:HTML, PDF, Excel, PPT
In Focus since 1984
Pity the lost knowledge of an old programmer!

 
Posts: 6347 | Location: 33°49'23.0"S, 151°11'41.0"E | Registered: October 31, 2006Report This Post
Francis Mariani
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posted Hide Post
I'm happy that my brain is still FOCUSing after all these years. Razzer


Francis


Give me code, or give me retirement. In FOCUS since 1991

Production: WF 7.7.05M, Dev Studio, BID, MRE, WebSphere, DB2 / Test: WF 8.1.05M, App Studio, BI Portal, Report Caster, jQuery, HighCharts, Apache Tomcat, MS SQL Server
 
Posts: 10577 | Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada | Registered: April 27, 2005Report This Post
Waz
Expert
posted Hide Post
Hopefully without assistance.

Eeker


Waz...

Prod:WebFOCUS 7.6.10/8.1.04Upgrade:WebFOCUS 8.2.07OS:LinuxOutputs:HTML, PDF, Excel, PPT
In Focus since 1984
Pity the lost knowledge of an old programmer!

 
Posts: 6347 | Location: 33°49'23.0"S, 151°11'41.0"E | Registered: October 31, 2006Report This Post
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