Search for Punctuation in a Field

[kime1974]

I am using Crystal XI. We have a report we use to determine if a field has punctuation in it. This is an audit report used to catch these errors prior to an extract being taken. We are currently looking for results to be returned in the select expert using the following:

like ["*!*", "*#*", "*$*", "*%*", "*(*", "*)*", "*-*", "*,*", "*.*", "*:*", "*`*", "*~*", "*+*", "*=*", "@"]

I was just wondering if there was something more efficient to do to look for any kind of punctuation in the field.

Thanks!
Kim

 

[briangriffin]

It might be easier to verify that every character is a valid alpha or numeric value - use this formula:

whileprintingrecords;
numbervar x := 0;
numbervar y;

for y := 1 to len({yourfield}) do
(if ascw({yourfield}[y]) in [65 to 90,97 to 122,48 to 57] then x
else x := x + 1);

x

Then by sorting or group selection you can identify any bad records as those where the formula <> 0.