T-SQL trim (and other non-alphanumeric characters)

Question

We have some input data that sometimes appears with   characters on the end.

The data comes in from the source system as varchar() and our attempts to cast a

Answer 1

This will remove all non alphanumeric chracters

CREATE FUNCTION [dbo].[fnRemoveBadCharacter]
(
    @BadString nvarchar(20)
)
RETURNS nvarchar(20)
AS
BEGIN

            DECLARE @nPos INTEGER
            SELECT @nPos = PATINDEX('%[^a-zA-Z0-9_]%', @BadString)

            WHILE @nPos > 0
            BEGIN
                        SELECT @BadString = STUFF(@BadString, @nPos, 1, '')
                        SELECT @nPos = PATINDEX('%[^a-zA-Z0-9_]%', @BadString)
            END

            RETURN @BadString
END

Use the function like:

UPDATE TableToUpdate
SET ColumnToUpdate = dbo.fnRemoveBadCharacter(ColumnToUpdate)
WHERE whatever