A mask is a description of a word, phrase, or number that identifies each character as alphabetic, numeric, or a special character. Masks use the following notation conventions:
|
A |
Indicates character is an alphabetic letter (a-z or A-Z) |
|
N |
Indicates character is a numeral (0-9) |
|
<special_char> |
Represents a special character, such as @, &, %, or punctuation, exactly as it appears in the word or phrase |
A special character (a character that is not a number or a letter) is shown exactly as it appears in the data value, including spaces. Special characters include forward slash (/), at symbol (@), percent (%), and so on.
- Examples:
-
A product code has this value:
1H-3389BD. The mask for the value isNA-NNNNAA.In postal addresses, a mask can define any series of five numerals in a postal code, instead of entering each of the 99,999 possible combinations in a table. The mask looks like
NNNNN. If special characters are included, such as those for nine-digit postal codes, it looks like this:NNNNN-NNNN.