>Hi everybody,
>
>I have a character string representing Style which consists of the following portions:
>
>Color (1 letter with - or without -) Type (one or 2 letters) Number portion (could be any number but usually no more than 5 digits and not less than 2) then Stone (1 letter) then quality (number) then color quality (1 letter), e.g. for example:
>W-4568S5B
>E460D4
>E94E
>
>Now, all these portions are optional except for number portion. My task is to get the number portion first, then try to search, if we have a file with the same number, same first portion, same stone (if it was present), different quality. Then if there are no files with the same stone, I need to do other string manipulations.
>
>Can you help me to get Number portion first?
>
>Thanks in advance.

try

? str(ABS(val(SUBSTR('W-4568S5B',2))))
? str(ABS(val(SUBSTR('E460D4',2))))
? str(ABS(val(SUBSTR('E94E',2))))