Regular expression pattern in the string and then also remove the substring

Question

I have a list of string which contains few set of characters and spaces in the beginning before encountered first three digits. if the pattern found then I need to collect only first three digits from the string.

Example1:

String: "SEE 222 Newcastle NSW 203"
Expected output: 222

Example2:

String: "SEE TEMP 212 Newcastle NSW 203"
Expected output: 212

Example3:

String: "SEE TEMP212 Newcastle NSW 203"
Expected output: 212

Answer 1

Sub TestExtractFirstThreeDigits()
    Dim testString1 As String
    Dim testString2 As String
    Dim result As String
    
    testString1 = "SEE 222 Newcastle NSW 203"
    testString2 = "SEE TEMP 212 Newcastle NSW 203"
    
    result = ExtractFirstThreeDigits(testString1)
    Debug.Print "Example 1: " & result ' Expected output: 222
    
    result = ExtractFirstThreeDigits(testString2)
    Debug.Print "Example 2: " & result ' Expected output: 212
End Sub

Function ExtractFirstThreeDigits(inputString As String) As String
    Dim regex As Object
    Dim matches As Object
    Dim firstThreeDigits As String
    
    ' Create the RegExp object
    Set regex = CreateObject("VBScript.RegExp")
    With regex
        .Pattern = "\b\d{3}\b" ' Pattern to match exactly three digits
        .Global = False ' We only need the first match
    End With
    
    ' Execute the regex search
    Set matches = regex.Execute(inputString)
    
    ' Check if any match is found
    If matches.Count > 0 Then
        firstThreeDigits = matches(0).Value
    Else
        firstThreeDigits = ""
    End If
    
    ' Return the first three digits found
    ExtractFirstThreeDigits = firstThreeDigits
End Function