>This was only tested with a few character strings and positive and negative numbers, but try

>? MyString = transform(val(Mystring))

>If the result is true, then MyString was a valid numeric value. Any non-numeric characters will break the "Val()" function and it won't transform back to the same string.
>
>If you have leading blanks to contend with you will need to add alltrim() to the original string.

>? allt(MyString) = transform(val(Mystring))

>I may have missed something obvious here, but it's quick for 'ordinary' strings.
>
>HTH
>Barbara
>
>>Is there a quick way to determine if a character string represents a legal numeric string (contains only digits and maybe a sign or .)?
>>
>>I've tried using type(),vartype() and evaluate(), but they don't give me quite the right thing.
>>
>>Suppose I have a variable NorC.
>>
>>If it contains the string '1.2' I want mytypefunc(NorC) to return 'N'
>>If it contains the string 'A.1' or '1.A' I want mytypefunc(NorC) to return 'C'
>>
>>EVALUATE('NorC') returns a character string in both cases.
>>EVALUATE(NorC) returns a numeric value in 1st case but gives an error in the second case.
>>
>>Combinations of vartype(),type() and evaluate() do not give what I want.

Barbara,

It would not work for some cases like:

set exact on
?"My String"
myString='10000.5903459059503'
?transform(val(Mystring))
?MyString = transform(val(Mystring))