hi all i need to pull numbers from a string (comments) and if i get 13 numbers then populate another field, this is to pull a possible barcode out of a comments field. i've got a working solution, but would like to know if there is a neater solution, Using SQL 7, in 2000 i would be able to have a user defined funtion to handle the string without the cursor, any input appreciated cheers mo CREATE PROCEDURE spxPPGenerateBarCodes AS DECLARE @Comments varchar(50) /* get a list of the comments that were imported today by spxPPImportNewPartNumber we can tell these by 'x-' */ DECLARE c1 CURSOR FOR SELECT Comments FROM tblItemMaster WHERE BarCode = 'x-' AND Comments IS NOT NULL OPEN c1 /* start the loop through table */ FETCH NEXT FROM c1 INTO @Comments WHILE @@FETCH_STATUS = 0 BEGIN /* we count the length of the comment to set the lenghth of the loop through to extract numeric's */ DECLARE @COUNTER integer SELECT @COUNTER = 1 WHILE (@COUNTER < (LEN(@Comments)+1)) BEGIN BEGIN IF ISNUMERIC(SUBSTRING(@Comments,@counter,1)) = 1 /* if we get a numeric we throw it in the BarCode field */ BEGIN UPDATE tblItemMaster SET BarCode = (BarCode + (LTRIM(SUBSTRING(@Comments,@counter,1)))) WHERE Comments = @Comments END END /* increment counter */ SELECT @COUNTER = @COUNTER +1 END /* keep the loop going */ FETCH NEXT FROM c1 INTO @Comments END /* close and clear the cursor */ CLOSE c1 DEALLOCATE c1 /* we now extract our barcode */ BEGIN UPDATE tblItemMaster SET BarCode = 'NEW' + RIGHT(BarCode,13) WHERE LEN(Barcode) = 15 AND LEFT(BarCode,2) = 'x-' END /* and set the leftovers back to NULL */ BEGIN UPDATE tblItemMaster SET BarCode = NULL WHERE LEFT(BarCode,2) = 'x-' END RETURN