A character pattern is a coded value which describes the shape of a data value. This topic describes the types of character patterns and includes examples of how they are used.
Character Pattern Example
The value Jane Smith has the pattern a4_a5, and the value 04/15/2016 has the value d2Sd2Sd4. The Jane Smith value shares the a4_a5 pattern with any two-word phrase that is separated by a space (represented by an underscore), the first word consisting of four alphabetic characters, and the second word consisting of five alphabetic characters. The date pattern d2Sd2Sd4 is a pattern for any date which uses the format mm/dd/yyyy.
Character Pattern Types
A repository administrator configures character patterns to be one of the following types for all data in a repository:
- Default
- Rich
- Long
- Greek
- Hebrew
- Turkish
Default
-
Table 1. Default pattern code Code
Represents…
a
alpha
d
digit
p
punctuation
_
space
z
null
.
unprintable
!
non-ASCII
c
carriage return
- Example:
-
Value
Pattern Shape
Jane Smith
a4_a5
5.00E+02
dpd2apd2
$400.00
pd3pd2 05/31/2016
d2pd2pd4 jane_smith@abc.com
a4pa5pa3pa3
Rich
The rich pattern code uses a short-hand notation to describe the shape of a value. It is useful for identifying the shapes of names, addresses, dates, currency, and simple numeric values that include plus (+) or minus (-) signs. This pattern style distinguishes between upper- and lowercase letters.
-
Table 2. Rich pattern code Code
Represents…
l
lowercase alpha
u
uppercase alpha
d
digit
p
punctuation
q
Apostrophe ('), double quote ("), Single quote (`)
S
symbol
_
space
z
null
.
unprintable
m
currency
+
plus sign
-
minus sign or dash
- Example:
-
Value
Pattern Shape
Jane Smith
ul3_ul4
5.00E+02
dSd2u+d2
$400.00
md3Sd2
05/31/2016
d2Sd2Sd4
jane_smith@abc.com
l4Sl5pl3Sl3
Long
The long pattern code uses a long-hand notation that identifies a character as either alphabetic (alpha) or numeric (digit), and displays all other characters exactly as they display in the value. For example, Jane Smith is represented as aaaa aaaaa, but $440.40 is represented as $nnn.nn.
-
Table 3. Long pattern code Code
Represents…
A
alpha
N
numeric (digit)
Any non-alpha or non-digit character displays exactly as it appears in the value.
- Example:
-
Value
Pattern Shape
Jane Smith
AAAA AAAAA 5.00E+02
N.NNA+NN $400.00
$NNN.NN 05/31/2016
NN/NN/NNNN jane_smith@abc.com
AAAA_AAAAA@AAA.AAA