RE: having to find an inv. # in a comment field :(

[<Matt.Haas@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I would break out each word, strip away things that aren't numbers and
letters, capitalize each word, and compare against a dictionary of known
ways that the word "invoice" is represented. I would consider the space,
comma, period, and pound symbols as delimiters to separate the words
(you may also want to be able to specify delimiters so you can add new
ones). You can also use a soundex on each word to see if it "sounds"
like any of the words in your pre-built dictionary of ways to spell
"invoice" (this will help with spelling mistakes). If there's a match on
"invoice", I'd also require another word to have a numeric in it, be
more than a couple of characters long, and meet any other general rules
you may have for invoice numbers to be considered a match. I'd think
this should get you close.

Matt

-----Original Message-----
From: rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:rpg400-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of steema@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Friday, January 27, 2006 2:00 PM
To: RPG programming on the AS400 / iSeries
Subject: having to find an inv. # in a comment field :(

Well this is the picture. Don't ask why, but we get some info
from abroad. They put invoice numbers in a comment field. The comment
field can have normal comment info (not invoice number) but when there
is
the invoice there, I need to put this in some other work file.

The len. of this comment field is 40.

It is not uniform. The ways it is there are:

INVOICE# XKC03J143L
INVOICE # XTG05K023L
INVOICE #   XSC06A016L
INV# XKC03G091L
INV. XTC05L053L
INV 5400960
INVOICES XTC05F008L AND XTC05F012L (in this case, I want to write 2
records)
INVOICE XTC05F009L
INVOICE #'S 2107071, 2107073 & 2107079
INVOICE #'S XSC04H008L & XTC04H021L

IN addition, there are several spelling mistakes on the word Invoice,
but
these are not my concern ( I was thinking how to take the file, run it
in
Microsoft spell check, perhaps someone has done this?).

Any thoughts on the coding would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Steve

INVOICES SHIPPED AFTER COST CHANGE (an example of a real comment)