Remove special characters from a string

Question

These are valid characters:

a-z
A-Z
0-9
-
/ 

How do I remove all other characters from my string?

Answer 1

Function RemoveCharacter(ByVal stringToCleanUp)
    Dim characterToRemove As String = ""
        characterToRemove = Chr(34) + "#$%&'()*+,-./\~"
        Dim firstThree As Char() = characterToRemove.Take(16).ToArray()
        For index = 1 To firstThree.Length - 1
            stringToCleanUp = stringToCleanUp.ToString.Replace(firstThree(index), "")
        Next
        Return stringToCleanUp
End Function

Answer 2

Use either regex or Char class functions like IsControl(), IsDigit() etc. Get a list of these functions here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.char_members.aspx

Here's a sample regex example:

(Import this before using RegEx)

Imports System.Text.RegularExpressions

In your function, write this

Regex.Replace(strIn, "[^\w\\-]", "")

This statement will replace any character that is not a word, \ or -. For e.g. aa-b@c will become aa-bc.

Answer 3

Dim txt As String
txt = Regex.Replace(txt, "[^a-zA-Z 0-9-/-]", "")

Answer 4

Dim cleanString As String = Regex.Replace(yourString, "[^A-Za-z0-9\-/]", "")