Returning part of a string in SQL Server

Question

In SQL Server how do I return part of a string? the data is not fixed however the number of characters is and its position in the string. for example I want to just return the N Prefix code that is 10 characters...

000010000100001LN000002496 00000 0496139796000000001101GOODS IN RM CHECK 003

Answer 1

SUBSTRING is your friend:

DECLARE @string VARCHAR(100)='000010000100001LN000002496 00000 0496139796000000001101GOODS IN RM CHECK 003';

SELECT SUBSTRING(@string,1,10); 

The result

0000100001

Find details here: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms187748.aspx

Answer 2

Please find the below generalized code which will get the data based on the position of the N.

declare @find varchar(100)='000010000100001LN000002496 00000    0496139796000000001101GOODS'

print  LEFT(SUBSTRING (@find,1,charindex('N',@find,1)-1),10)

if you remove the LEFT function in the above sql, then it will give the complete prefix of the N in the string data.