Replacing string with empty vector

Question

I'm trying to modify this code so that if the input of this function contains the letter 'Z', it will return return an empty vector. I am able to do this for the letter 'Q' or 'Z' if it is at the beginning of string, but unfortunately it won't work if either of these two letters are at the end.

function d = change(a)
new_claim = regexprep(a, 'A', '2');
new_claim1 = regexprep(new_claim, 'B', '2');
new_claim2 = regexprep(new_claim1, 'C', '2');
new_claim3 = regexprep(new_claim2, 'D', '3');
new_claim4 = regexprep(new_claim3, 'E', '3');
new_claim5 = regexprep(new_claim4, 'F', '3');
new_claim6 = regexprep(new_claim5, 'G', '4');
new_claim7 = regexprep(new_claim6, 'H', '4');
new_claim8 = regexprep(new_claim7, 'I', '4');
new_claim9 = regexprep(new_claim8, 'J', '5');
new_claim10 = regexprep(new_claim9, 'K', '5');
new_claim11 = regexprep(new_claim10, 'L', '5');
new_claim12 = regexprep(new_claim11, 'M', '6');
new_claim13 = regexprep(new_claim12, 'N', '6');
new_claim14 = regexprep(new_claim13, 'O', '6');
new_claim15 = regexprep(new_claim14, 'P', '7');
new_claim16 = regexprep(new_claim15, 'R', '7');
new_claim17 = regexprep(new_claim16, 'S', '7');
new_claim18 = regexprep(new_claim17, 'T', '8');
new_claim19 = regexprep(new_claim18, 'U', '8');
new_claim20 = regexprep(new_claim19, 'V', '8');
new_claim21 = regexprep(new_claim20, 'W', '9');
new_claim22 = regexprep(new_claim21, 'X', '9');
new_claim23 = regexprep(new_claim22, 'Y', '9');
new_claim24 = regexprep(new_claim23, '-', ' ');
new_claim25 = regexprep(new_claim24, '(', '');
new_claim26 = regexprep(new_claim25, ')','');
d = new_claim26;
if strfind(d,'Q') == true 
    d = [];
elseif strfind(d,'Z') == true 
    d = [];
else
    return;
end

rayryeng · Accepted Answer · 2015-05-25 19:23:46Z

If it's your desire to check to see if a string contains the letter Z or z, maybe put this at the beginning of your code:

if ~isempty(regexp(a, '[Zz]'))
    d = [];
    return;
end

If you also wanted to check for Q or q, you can do:

if ~isempty(regexp(a, '[ZzQq]'))
    d = [];
    return;
end

The above uses a regular expression to see if there are any characters in your string that contain either Z or z (or Q or q, depending on what you want). regexp returns the indices of where these characters were found. If there were Z or z (or Q or q characters, depending on what you want) characters found, then the indices would be non-empty, hence the ~isempty check. If there were no Z or z (or Q or q) characters that were found, this would be empty and so this statement is skipped. What's important is that if we have found Z, z (or Q, q) characters, we immediately make d empty and return so that the rest of the logic is not run.

You can then carry on with the rest of your code.

Tamás Szabó · Accepted Answer · 2015-05-25 19:18:05Z

1

You can check if a character is in a string with: any(d == 'Q') || any(d == 'Z')

answered May 25, 2015 at 19:18

Tamás Szabó

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