Thanks Kevin,
Thought that I had seen something on string patterns when I started
..NETting from VB6 this last year. It would have been nice if they
(Microsoft) referenced "regular expressions" in their "format"
documentation (I could have overread it :( ). Guess I have some
more reading to do, kind of reminds me of what I remember of "awk". It
would be helpful if someone documented the formatting abilities of
"regular expressions" and "Regex". For example I see from your and
MS's examples the use of the "\d" escape but it is not referenced in
their "character escapes" documentation - ah - there it is in the
"character classes". Now to implement it, see how it plays .......
Kevin thanks for your assitance,
Scott
Kevin Spencer wrote:[color=blue]
> Hi Scott,
>
> Since you want to ensure that the format is correct, another option would be
> to use a Regular Expression. A Regular Expression matches patterns in a
> string. So, for example, if you wanted to format a phone number as "(@@@)
> @@@ @@@@" you could use something ike the following:
>
> (\d{3})[^\d]*(\d{3})[^\d]*(\d{4})
>
> What this regular expression says is: Find 3 digits followed by 0 or more
> non-digits, followed by 3 digits, followed by 0 or more non-digits, followed
> by 4 digits. It puts the first 3 digits into Group 1, the second 3 into
> Group 2, and the last 4 into Group 3. I tested it against the following:
>
> 1234567890
> 123 456-7890
> (123) 456 - 7890
> 12 Baker's Street 19005
> 123 45th Ave.
> 12-23-456-789-10
> 123 (456) abcde 890
>
> It found matches in the first 3 items, but none in any of the others,
> because they did not have the right number of digits in the right sequence.
> The last item *will* match if you add one more digit at the end.
>
> You can then use the Regex Class to add your formatting, by formatting each
> Group in each Match.
>
> --
> HTH,
>
> Kevin Spencer
> Microsoft MVP
> Professional Chicken Salad Alchemist
>
> I recycle.
> I send everything back to the planet it came from.
>
> "L. Scott M." <scotter59@comcast.net> wrote in message
> news:1150988165.258948.32160@y41g2000cwy.googlegro ups.com...[color=green]
> >I am not too pleased with this solution. First I could not inherit
> > from string in the hopes of adding my own formatting to the string
> > object. But this is what I can glean to "format" this strings data:
> >
> > dim x as string
> > x = "20060622163321"
> > y = String.Format("{0}\{1}\{2} {3}:{4}:{5}", Left(x, 4), Mid(x, 5, 2),
> > Mid(x, 7, 2), Mid(x, 9, 2), Mid(x, 11, 2), Mid(x, 13, 2))
> >
> > with the "y" result being:
> > 2006\06\22 16:33:21
> >
> > Of course this will pop if the string is less than 14 characters.
> >
> > Thanks again,
> > Scott
> >
> >
> >
> > L. Scott M. wrote:[color=darkred]
> >> Thanks for the post, with the link, taking a little while to get at it.
> >> Apparently "msdn2" server has been busy for the last three and a half
> >> hours. Would like to see a solution without manually having to break
> >> up the string (left,right,mid) - almost be inclined to
> >> override/overload the string object and add the old style formatting to
> >> it, if that could be done to the string object. It would be a simple
> >> replacement routine with a few masking rules.
> >>
> >> A perplexed
> >> Scott
> >>
> >>
> >> Kevin Spencer wrote:
> >> > This might be helpful:
> >> >
> >> >
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/a292he7t.aspx
> >> >
> >> > --
> >> > HTH,
> >> >
> >> > Kevin Spencer
> >> > Microsoft MVP
> >> > Professional Chicken Salad Alchemist
> >> >
> >> > I recycle.
> >> > I send everything back to the planet it came from.
> >> >
> >> > "L. Scott M." <scotter59@comcast.net> wrote in message
> >> > news:1150938340.755276.184990@i40g2000cwc.googlegr oups.com...
> >> > > Thanks for the post.
> >> > > I must be misreading something, without resorting to VB6 namespace -
> >> > > or
> >> > > - writing my own formatting code. I would like to format the data in
> >> > > a
> >> > > "string" object in the following manner - example phone number:
> >> > >
> >> > > dim x as string
> >> > > x = "7034449999"
> >> > > (703) 444 9999
> >> > >
> >> > > or
> >> > >
> >> > > x = "703PRSWXYY"
> >> > > (703) PRS WXYY
> >> > >
> >> > > This does not appear to work ?
> >> > > string.format("{0:(###) ### ####}", x)
> >> > > neither does this ? (microsoft removed "@")
> >> > > string format("{0:(@@@) @@@ @@@@}", x)
> >> > >
> >> > > I know that I must be missing something simple in this, but from
> >> > > Microsoft's documentation I do not understand the technique to format
> >> > > a
> >> > > simple string object - without actually writing a function to format
> >> > > my
> >> > > string which I could do in less time than I am writing this.
> >> > >
> >> > > TIA
> >> > > I appologize for my denseness,
> >> > > Scott M.
> >> > >
> >> > >
> >> > > Kevin Spencer wrote:
> >> > >>
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/lib...ng.format.aspx
> >> > >>
> >> > >> --
> >> > >> HTH,
> >> > >>
> >> > >> Kevin Spencer
> >> > >> Microsoft MVP
> >> > >> Professional Chicken Salad Alchemist
> >> > >>
> >> > >> I recycle.
> >> > >> I send everything back to the planet it came from.
> >> > >>
> >> > >> "L. Scott M." <scotter59@comcast.net> wrote in message
> >> > >> news:1150912018.233239.41390@c74g2000cwc.googlegro ups.com...
> >> > >> > Have a quick simple question:
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > dim x as string
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > x = "1234567890"
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > -------------------------------------------------------
> >> > >> > VB 6
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > dim y as string
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > y = format(x,"(@@@) @@@ @@@@")
> >> > >> > y is now ---------------------> (123) 456 7890
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > (think that is the correct VB 6 syntax)
> >> > >> > -------------------------------------------------------
> >> > >> > VB NET
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > How can I do this using formatting in VB.NET since the "@" and
> >> > >> > other
> >> > >> > characters are no longer used. I would prefer to avoid verbose
> >> > >> > methods
> >> > >> > - using LEFT, MID, RIGHT....
> >> > >> >
> >> > >> > -------------------------------------------------------
> >> > >> > TIA
> >> > >> > Scott M.
> >> > >> >
> >> > >[/color]
> >[/color][/color]
