ChrisM@Work (5/8/2012)

---

Interpreting the results from this isn't straightforward, at least not to me. I prefer the output formatted like this:

SELECT Strings, x.Goodchars, y.Badchars

FROM #t

CROSS APPLY (

SELECT SUBSTRING(Strings,n,1)

FROM (SELECT TOP (DATALENGTH(Strings)) n = ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY @@SPID) FROM sys.columns a, sys.columns b) n

WHERE SUBSTRING(Strings,n,1) LIKE '%[a-zA-Z0-9]%'

FOR XML PATH('')

) x (Goodchars)

CROSS APPLY (

SELECT SUBSTRING(Strings,n,1)

FROM (SELECT TOP (DATALENGTH(Strings)) n = ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY @@SPID) FROM sys.columns a, sys.columns b) n

WHERE SUBSTRING(Strings,n,1) LIKE '%[^a-zA-Z0-9]%'

FOR XML PATH('')

) y (Badchars)

Otherwise, an interesting article. Putting ^ into the @allowed string was a bit naughty 😉