Question

I’m currently working with parsing some data from SQL Server and I’m in need of help with a Regex.

I have an assembly in Sql Server 2005 that helps me Replace strings using C# Regex.Replace() Method.

I need to parse the following.

    Strings:

    CAD 90890

    (CAD 90892)

    CAD G67859

    CAD 34G56

    CAD 3S56.

    AX CAD 890990

    CAD 783783 MX

    Needed Results:

    90890

    90892

    G67859

    34G56

    3S56

    890990

    783783 

SELECT TOP 25 CADCODE, dbo.RegExReplace(CADCODE, '*pattern*', '$1')
FROM dbo.CADCODES
WHERE CADCODE LIKE '%CAD%'

I need to get the proceeding string after the CAD word until it hits a white-space or anything that not a number or digit. I managed to get the digits but it really fails on others. I’m trying to get it to work but I can’t find a real solution.

Thanks in advance.

Updated to reflect new Strings

AX CAD 890990

CAD 783783 MX

Answer 1

Try this:

(\w+)\W*$

The pattern matches the last word – made of alphanumeric (and underscores).
Example: http://www.rubular.com/r/1zWQQVLZy1

Another option is to find a word with at least one digit – this one can match anywhere on the string, so you may need to handle multiple matches. In this case, you can add a capturing group around the whole pattern, or replace using $&.

[a-zA-Z_]*\d\w*

Example: http://www.rubular.com/r/XUrFNuPQUv

If you can’t match (Regex.Match) and must use Regex.Replace, you can match the entire string start to end and replace it with the group you need:

RegExReplace(CADCODE, '^.*\b([a-zA-Z_]*\d\w*)\b.*$', '$1')