>>Hi All:
>>
>>How do I remove duplicate characters in a string:
>>
>>

>>Bigstring = 'cattttccv'
>>NonDupeString = NonDupe(BigString)
>>
>>* Result = 'catv'
>>

>>
>>Thanks,
>>
>>Yossi
>
>I must say that I am not comfortable posting my solution with all the backslash going around from useless people that only come here to confront or incite worthless fights... Maybe Fernando can time it to see if it worth pursuing it but I think it is very fast:
>
>

>lcText				= REPLICATE('ccaaaaattttttttttvvvv', 102400)
>lnStart				= SECONDS()
>loRegExp			= Createobject('VBScript.RegExp')
>
>with loRegexp as VBScript.RegExp
>	.IgnoreCase			= .t.
>	.Global				= .t.
>	.Multiline			= .T.
>	.Pattern			= '(\w)(\1+)'
>	lcNewText			= .Replace(lcText, '$1')
>endwith
>
>? SECONDS() - lnStart, LEN(lcNewText)
>

>
>(and by the way, this solution is very generic, it can be implemented in any language)


As you have found this does not work because
- the \1 matches one char at a time
- the chars are not necessarily consecutive

I think you have to loop

This is case sensitive

lcText				= 'abcabcabcaaaaaaa.,aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.,'

loRegExp			= Createobject('VBScript.RegExp')
loRegexp.IgnoreCase = .f.
loRegexp.Global= .f.
loRegexp.Multiline	= .f.
loRegexp.Pattern			= '(.)(.*)(\1)'  && any char occurring twice

?lcText
do while .t. 
	matches = loRegExp.Execute(m.lcText)
	if( matches.Count == 0 )
		exit
	endif
	lcText = strtran(m.lcText, matches.Item[0].SubMatches[0], '', 2) 
enddo
?lcText