GSquared (8/13/2012)

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I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure Replace() won't take regex or other patterns. I'm pretty sure it only deals with strings or string-type variables with pre-defined values.

However, solving this with Stuff() would be quite easy.

SELECT string,

CHARINDEX('%', string, 1),

CHARINDEX('%', string, CHARINDEX('%', string, 1) + 1) - CHARINDEX('%', string, 1),

STUFF(string, CHARINDEX('%', string, 1),

CHARINDEX('%', string, CHARINDEX('%', string, 1) + 1) - CHARINDEX('%', string, 1) + 1, 'replaced')

FROM (SELECT 'somestring+%sometext%' AS string

UNION ALL

SELECT '%sometext%'

UNION ALL

SELECT 'somestring+%sometext%+somesecondstring') AS Example;

The first three columns are just the internal pieces of the logic. The final column is what you need for this kind of thing.