I would like to give it a try, see the code following:

DATA _NULL_; LENGTH A B $ 200; A='This string contains phone number like 973 123 4567, and a model number, like Pentium III/450'; b=a; put 'a= ' a; a=translate(a,'~','1','~','2','~','3','~','4','~','5','~','6','~','7','~','8 ','~','9','~','0'); put 'a= ' a; pos=index(a,'~~~ ~~~ ~~~~'); substr(a,pos,12)=''; put 'a= ' a; len=length(b); do i=1 to len; if substr(a,i,1) ne substr(b,i,1) and substr(a,i,1) ne ' ' then substr(a,i,1)=substr(b,i,1); end; put 'a= ' a; run;

----- log file ---

a= This string contains phone number like 973 123 4567, and a model number, like Pentium III/450 a= This string contains phone number like ~~~ ~~~ ~~~~, and a model number, like Pentium III/~~~ a= This string contains phone number like , and a model number, like Pentium III/~~~ a= This string contains phone number like , and a model number, like Pentium III/450

In case your string may already contains '~', you can replace it with something like 'FA'x.

Hope this helps

Ya Huang

-----Original Message----- From: Bill Kossack [mailto:kossack@NETCOM11.NETCOM.COM] Sent: Tuesday, October 12, 1999 5:10 PM To: SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU Subject: Re: Filtering out a phone number

The rest of the string can contain numbers such as equipment model numbers that are of interest.

Richard Read Allen <rrallen@ibm.net> wrote:

: Is it possible for the useful consistent information to contain the digits : 0-9? If not, then use compress(x,'0123456789'). If it can contain digits, it's : a more difficult problem.

-- William S. Kossack Westminster, Colorado kossack@netcom.com