Validate String with a pattern

Question

How can we validate the string with a pattern?
eg. Value should always be of the format C-DDD,
where C is a character (A-Z or a-z) and
          D represents a digit(0-9)
Valid forms are A-001, A-987, Z-098 and
not valid forms are A-01, 1-A01, 1- 0A0, A-A01, A-0001
Say internal table contains values like this.
F1     F2      F3
1     00001  A-001
2     00001  A-A01
3     00001  B-909
4     00001  Z-01
5     00001  k-0001
Valid records are 1 and 3.

Answer 1

Hi,
you can use regular expressions for this, e.g.:
  FIND ALL OCCURRENCES OF REGEX '[a-z,A-Z]-[0-9]{3}[ [:blank:] ]'
       IN TABLE t_data
       RESPECTING CASE
       RESULTS t_results.
Note that in the above example all fields in the table will be checked. If this is not practical for your use you can use a LOOP and FIND on the table field.
Note that line 5 in your example also matches the pattern you have given. If you really do not want to see this as valid you will have to use the pattern: '[A-Z]-[0-9][ [:blank:] ]'. The addition of [ [:blank:] ] is only needed if your field is longer than the pattern, i.e. 5 characters.
Good luck,
Gert.
Edit: This will also be pretty efficient.
Edited by: Gert Beukema on Jul 15, 2008 10:36 AM