One of the many MySQLÂ string functions is the SOUNDEX() function. This function returns a Soundex string from a given string. If two words sound the same, they should have the same Soundex string. If two words sound similar, but not exactly the same, their Soundex string might look similar but not exactly the same.
This article contains a bunch of Soundex examples to demonstrate how the SOUNDEX() function works in MySQL.
If you need to convert a number from decimal to octal (base 8), two functions come to mind if you’re using MySQL. One function is specifically for doing octal conversions, the other is for doing conversions between different bases. These are as follows:
OCT()CONV()More about these two functions below.
If you use Oracle Database or MySQL, you’re lucky enough to have the LPAD() and RPAD() functions, which allow you to pad a string with a given character (or characters) to its left and/or right.
However, SQL Server (or more precisely, T-SQL), doesn’t include these functions. So if you need some left padding, you’ll need to improvise.
This article presents four options for padding a number with leading zeros in SQL Server. So you can do stuff like turn 7 into 007. Three of these options work on strings, so you can also apply padding to textual data.
Sometimes you need to pad a string with spaces. Or perhaps you’ll pad it with another character. Sometimes you need to pad it on the left. Other times you need to pad it on the right. Or maybe you need to pad it on both sides.
All of the above can be done in MySQL using the LPAD() and/or RPAD() string functions.
When working with MySQL, you might occasionally encounter situations where you need to pad a bunch of numbers with leading zeros.
Perhaps you have a requirement that all numbers have three digits, but in the data you’ve been supplied, the numbers range from a single digit, to two, and maybe three digits. Your requirement might be to pad all numbers with leading zeros, but only to make up for any shortfall in the three digit requirement.
The LPAD() function does exactly what you want in this scenario.
In SQL Server, you can use the T-SQL REPLACE() function to replace all instances of a given string with another string. For example, you can replace all occurrences of a certain word with another word.
The MySQL REPLACE() function enables you to replace all occurrences of a substring with another string. It allows you to do things like, replace all occurrences of one word with another word, etc.
This article demonstrates its usage.
This article demonstrates how to repeat a string multiple times in MySQL using the REPEAT() function.
As the name suggests, the REPEAT() function can be used to repeat a string. More specifically, it allows you to specify how many times the string should be repeated.
Using a backslash to escape single quotes is a commonly used technique to ensure that the single quotes don’t interfere with MySQL‘s handling of the full string.
Single quotes are used to surround a string, so a single quote within the string itself could cause havoc if it isn’t properly escaped. Simply inserting a backslash immediately before the quote mark ensures that MySQL doesn’t terminate the string prematurely.
However, there may be occasions where you want the backslash to remain. For example, you might intend to use the string in an SQL statement, and therefore, you want it to be properly escaped first.
This is where the QUOTE() function comes in.
The MySQL QUOTE() function quotes a string to produce a result that can be used as a properly escaped data value in an SQL statement. The string is returned enclosed by single quotation marks and with each instance of backslash (\), single quote ('), ASCII NUL, and Control+Z preceded by a backslash.
MySQL has a number of string functions that return the position of a substring within a string. More specifically, they return the position of the first occurrence within the string (or the first occurrence after a given starting point).
The functions I’m referring to are as follows:
INSTR()LOCATE()POSITION()Below is an overview of each one.