Using pattern in Index function

Question

Hi, We have a requirement where we want to get first alphabet wherever it appears in the string. For e.g. if we have 12XOF then we want to take out first occurance of Alphabet which is X. If string is 1234y then we want y to be in out output field. It can be anywhere in the alphanumeric string.
I was thinking of using pattern matching in Index function but realized I can not do that. So now I am not sure what I can use to get the first occurance of alphabet in the input string of  alphanumeric. Match can say it matches or not but can not give me the value of that alphabet.
Thanks,

Answer 1

You can create a custom function to strip out the numbers, and give you the first occurence of the alphabet.
$Letter = '';
$Out_String = '';
while(length($P_Input_String) <> 0 and length($Out_String) < 1)
begin
$Letter = substr($P_Input_String,1,1);
if (match_pattern($Letter,'9') = 0)
     begin
     $Out_String = $Out_String||$Letter;
     end
$P_Input_String = substr($P_Input_String,2,length($P_Input_String)-1);
end
Return $Out_String;
$P_Input_String should be an input parameter,
$Letter and $Out_String should be variables created for the function.
Use this custom function in the mapping tab and pass the input string to get the output values.
Regards,
Suneer.