>>>I have a character field zip c(5) containing zipcodes. I need to set a filter to select the bad entries which contain alpha characters. This is done in Access code using the LIKE function (not like('#####'), but VFP handles LIKE differently. This would also seem to be a simple matter but I can't seem to find the answer. I could find a bad entry by parsing the values but that doesn't serve my need to set a filter.
>>>
>>>Any thoughts?
>>
>>What about
>>
>>? transform(val(ZipCode)) == ZipCode && Valid Zip Code Assuming all 5 digits are always present
>
>Hugo -
>Thanks for your idea.
>The field is populated by a scanner using OCR, so there is no assurance that there will always be 5 characters. Plus nulls are allowed in the table.
>
>the following code:
>

>set filter to ! transform(val(ZipCode)) == ZipCode
>

>reveals blanks and zipcodes beginning with 0 as well as those containing alpha characters.

SET FILTER TO LEN(CHRTRAN(EVL(NVL(ZipCode,[A]),[A]),[0123456789],[])) > 0 OR;
              LEFT(ZipCode,1)  == [0] && Zero

(not tested)