topic Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string in Data Management Questions

Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

LukeSnyder — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 12:32:07 GMT

Hi All. I'm looking for some VBScript help (or Python) to add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string. I can manage with fixed length strings, but not variable ones. 12345 = 12-345 and 123456 = 123-456.

Thanks in advance.

Luke

Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

VinceAngelo — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 12:41:55 GMT

No matter the language, the task is the same:

Compute string length
Create new string composed of:
1. substring(pos 1 to (len-3))
2. hyphen
3. substring(pos len-2 to len)

The syntax is different in each language, as well as the radix of the first character (0 or 1) and the exact invocation of the substring function.

- V

Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

DanPatterson_Retired — Sun, 12 Dec 2021 01:26:58 GMT

got to love slicing (EDIT oooops Sorry Vince ... was playing and didn't see you had posted already)

>>> a = '123456'
>>> out = a[:len(a)-3]+'-'+a[len(a)-3:]
>>> out
'123-456'
>>> a = '12345'
>>> out = a[:len(a)-3]+'-'+a[len(a)-3:]
>>> out
'12-345'
>>>

Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

VinceAngelo — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 13:08:44 GMT

No worries. I often work with larger strings, which are O(N) in the length function, so I usually capture length once, vice embeding it twice. Yes, an optimizer might pick that up, but I like to pitch softly at optimizers.

- V

Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

LukeSnyder — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 13:09:01 GMT

Thanks guys!

Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

TimWitt2 — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 13:11:35 GMT

Don't forget to mark the post with the correct answer as correct

Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

TedKowal — Sun, 12 Dec 2021 01:27:01 GMT

VBSCRIPT:

dim a as string 
a = "MyFavoriteString123" 
a = Left(a, Len(a) - 3) & "-" & Right(a, 3)

Re: Add a hyphen before the last 3 characters of variable length string

LukeSnyder — Fri, 24 Apr 2015 14:26:26 GMT

Thanks Ted. I'm still learning...and always will be of course. I like this approach.