Overview
Match Key Functions are applied to Match keys to determine how records are clustered. Refer to Match Job Advanced Settings for details on applying Match Keys and functions to a Match job.
Match Key Functions
The following functions can be applied to any one match key (e.g. TRIM(Address1)), to multiple match keys (e.g. TRIM(Address1+Address2)), or can be combined (e.g. UPPER(TRIM(Address1))).
TRIM(field)—removes leading and trailing whitespace from the field
LTRIM(field)—removes leading whitespace only from the field
RTRIM(field)—removes trailing whitespace only from the field
PUNTRIM(field)—removes all non-alphanumeric characters from the field
UPPER(field)—uppercases the field
LOWER(field)—lowercases the field
LEFT(field,count)—extracts characters from the left of the field. If the count exceeds the length, then the field is returned as-is.
RIGHT(field,count)—extracts characters from the right of the field. If the count exceeds the length then the field is returned as-is.
SUBSTRING(field,start,count)—extracts characters from within the field (start is 0-based, so use 0 for the first character). The data returned is not padded if there are insufficient characters.
Note
Functions are best used with raw input data (names, address lines, postcodes, etc.).