indesign grep : 3 and 4 digit numbers to 5 digits by adding zeros

[renéb52836404]

hello,

in an indesign catalog i would like to change 3 and 4 digit numbers to 5 digits.

3 digit numbers should get 2 zeros up front, 4 digit numbers should get one zero.

5 digit numbers should remain unchanged.

f.i. :

465 -> 00465

5567 -> 05567

23167 -> 23167

i'm pretty sure this can be done by a grep find and replace, but i don't know how.

any help is appreciated.

rené bosch

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Yes, but knowing current "surrounding" of the digits would be helpful - can you share a screenshot?

Would have to be done in two steps anyway. 

[renéb52836404]

hi robert,

the numbers are in a table and have paragraph styles. here is a screenshot, it concerns the bold numbers only :

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

I'm on my phone so I'll just brainstorm... 

[1-9]\d\d\d

00$0

and

[1-9]\d\d\d\d

0$0

[renéb52836404]

thanks robert.

unfortunately, '[1-9]\d\d\d' finds the first 3 digits in a 4 digit number as well. that should not be the case.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Right, add "^" at the beginning - start of paragraph - and "$" at the end:

^\d\d\d$

00$0

[jmlevy]

Try this, and as @Robert at ID-Tasker wrote, you'll need 2 steps:

For the 3 digits numbers

Find: \b\d{3}\b

Replace: 00$0

For the 4 digits numbers

Find: \b\d{4}\b

Replace: 0$0

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Yeah, word boundary will work as well.

@renéb52836404

And to be even more "direct" - you can specify ParaStyle.

[renéb52836404]

thanks robert and jm 🙂

both solutions work well.