Question

I have a MySQL table with a field of sequential numbers (MS-1, MS-2, …, MS-100, …, MS-800, etc.) These numbers are a unique identifier (not primary key) for a set of data. The problem is sorting. Is there a way to take this field and generate a new field to be used for sorting? It would need to take MS-1 and make it ms0001, MS-845 to ms0845, etc.

I need to end up with two fields: one that contains the original value (MS-1) and one that contains the normalized value “ms0001”. The MS-1 will be used for display, while ms0001 will be used in a link.

Also, this field would need to be automatically generated for new rows.

Thanks!

Update: As suggested by eggyal, I tried this:

UPDATE Resources 
SET collNum = CONCAT('MS-',LPAD(SUBSTRING_INDEX(eadFaUniqueIdentifier,'-',-1),4,'0')

Resources is the table in question,
collNum is the new field I’m trying to generate,
eadFaUniqueIdentifier contains the original value.

However, I get this error: #1064 – You have an error in your SQL syntax; check the manual that corresponds to your MySQL server version for the right syntax to use near ” at line 2. (I’m using MySQL 5.1.61.)

Answer 1

take eggyal’s answer: https://stackoverflow.com/a/11809954/491243
but if you want to permanently change its values the you can try this:

UPDATE myTable
SET columnA = CASE char_length(replace(columnA,'MS-', ''))
                   WHEN 0 THEN 'MS-0000'
                   WHEN 1 THEN CONCAT('MS-000', replace(columnA, 'MS-', ''))
                   WHEN 2 THEN CONCAT('MS-00', replace(columnA, 'MS-', ''))
                   WHEN 3 THEN CONCAT('MS-0', replace(columnA, 'MS-', ''))
                   ELSE        columnA
              END

myTable – change it to your original’s table name
columnA – change to the name of your column which contains MS-* value

As suggested by eggyal:

UPDATE myTable 
SET columnA = CONCAT('MS-',LPAD(SUBSTRING_INDEX(columnA,'-',-1),4,'0'))