How to Replace Multiple Characters in Access SQL?

Question

I\'m a novice at SQL, so hopefully someone can spell this out for me. I tried following the \"Replace Multiple Strings in SQL Query\" posting, but I got stuck.

I\'

Answer 1

You could use the built in Replace function within Access

SELECT
    Replace(Replace(Replace(ShipToPlant, "#", ""), "-", ""), "/", "") AS ShipToPlant
FROM
    BTST

As others have said, within Access you can write your own functions in VBA and use them in your queries.

EDIT:

Here's a way to handle the nested Replace limit by wrappering the Replace function within our own function. It feels dirty but it works- put this in a module within Access

Public Function SuperReplace(ByRef field As String, ByVal ReplaceString As String) As String
    ' Size this as big as you need... it is zero-based by default' 
    Dim ReplaceArray(3) As String

    'Fill each element with the character you need to replace'  
    ReplaceArray(0) = "#"
    ReplaceArray(1) = "-"
    ReplaceArray(2) = "/"
    ReplaceArray(3) = " "

    Dim i As Integer
    For i = LBound(ReplaceArray) To UBound(ReplaceArray)    
       field = Replace(field, ReplaceArray(i), ReplaceString)
    Next i

    SuperReplace = field    
End Function

Then test it with this query

SELECT 
    SuperReplace(ShipToPlant,"") AS ShipToPlant
FROM
    BTST

You might want to take this an expand it so that you can pass in an array of strings instead of hard-coding them into the function.

EDIT 2:

In response to the additional information in the comments on the question, here's a suggestion for how you might want to handle the situation differently. The advantage to this apprach is that once you have mapped in a plant name permutation, you won't need to perform a string replace on future data in future years, only add new plant names and permutations to the map.

Start with creating another table, let's call it plant_map

CREATE TABLE plant_map (id AUTOINCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, name TEXT, master_id LONG)

into plant_map, add all of the permutations for plant names and insert the id for the name you wish to use to refer to a particular plant name permutation group with, into the master_id field. From your comments, I'll use Signode Service

INSERT INTO plant_map(name, master_id) VALUES ("Signode Service", 1);
INSERT INTO plant_map(name, master_id) VALUES ("Signode Svc", 1);
INSERT INTO plant_map(name, master_id) VALUES ("Signode - Service", 1);
INSERT INTO plant_map(name, master_id) VALUES ("Signode svc", 1);
INSERT INTO plant_map(name, master_id) VALUES ("SignodeService", 1);

Now when you query BTST table, you can get data for Signode Service using

SELECT
    field1,
    field2
FROM
    BTST source
INNER JOIN
    (
    plant_map map1      
    INNER JOIN
    plant_map map2
    ON map1.master_id = map2.id
    )
    ON source.ShipToPlant = map1.name
WHERE
    map2.name = "Signode Service"

Data within table BTST can remain unchanged.

Essentially, this is joining on the plant name in BTST to the name in plant_map then, using master_id, self joining on id within plant_map so that you need only pass in one "common" name. I would advise putting an index on each of the columns name and master_id in plant_map as both fields will be used in joins.

Answer 2

This query grabs the 3 first characters and replace them with Blanks

Example: BO-1234
Output: 1234

BO: IIf(IsNumeric(Left([sMessageDetails],3)),[sMessageDetails],Replace([sMessageDetails],Left([sMessageDetails],3),""))

Answer 3

Create a public function in a Code module.

Public Function StripChars(ByVal pStringtoStrip As Variant, ByVal pCharsToKeep As String) As String

Dim sChar As String
Dim sTemp As String
Dim iCtr As Integer

  sTemp = ""

  For iCtr = 1 To Len(pStringtoStrip)
    sChar = Mid(pStringtoStrip, iCtr, 1)
    If InStr(pCharsToKeep, sChar) > 0 Then
      sTemp = sTemp & sChar
    End If
  Next

  StripChars = sTemp

End Function

Then in your query

SELECT
    StripChars(ShipToPlant, "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789") AS ShipToPlantDisplay  
FROM 
    BTST

Notes - this will be slow for lots of records - if you what this to be permanent then create an update query using the same function.

EDIT: to do an Update:

UPDATE BTST
    SET ShipToPlant = StripChars(ShipToPlant, "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789")