SQL Server TRIM character

Question

I have the following string: \'BOB*\', how do I trim the * so it shows up as \'BOB\'

I tried the RTRIM(\'BOB*\',\'*\') but does not work as says needs only 1 paramet

Answer 1

I really like Teejay's answer, and almost stopped there. It's clever, but I got the "almost too clever" feeling, as, somehow, your string at some point will actually have a ~ (or whatever) in it on purpose. So that's not defensive enough for me to put into production.

I like Chris' too, but the PATINDEX call seems like overkill.

Though it's probably a micro-optimization, here's one without PATINDEX:

CREATE FUNCTION dbo.TRIMMIT(@stringToTrim NVARCHAR(MAX), @charToTrim NCHAR(1))
RETURNS NVARCHAR(MAX)
AS
BEGIN
    DECLARE @retVal NVARCHAR(MAX)

    SET @retVal = @stringToTrim

    WHILE 1 = charindex(@charToTrim, reverse(@retVal))
        SET @retVal = SUBSTRING(@retVal,0,LEN(@retVal))

    WHILE 1 = charindex(@charToTrim, @retVal)
        SET @retVal = SUBSTRING(@retVal,2,LEN(@retVal))

    RETURN @retVal
END

--select dbo.TRIMMIT('\\trim\asdfds\\\', '\')
--trim\asdfds

Returning a MAX nvarchar bugs me a little, but that's the most flexible way to do this..