How to eliminate ( ) / and - out of phone numbers

[Rangoon]

I have a [Phone] file with over 2500 numbers with all different types of separators. Some area codes are separated by ( ), others by / and still others by -. I currently use the following calculation,

"(" & Left(Phone Numbers::Communication Data,3) & ")" & Middle(hPhone Numbers::Communication Data, 4, 3) & "-" & Right( Phone Numbers::Communication Data, 4)

That makes all phone numbers look the same (800)555-1212.

But all the phone numbers are still the way they were initally entered into the [Phone] file. I want to be able to go into the [Phone] file and take out all separators so I just have the numbers like 8005551212. What is a good way of doing so? I use FM 5.5...

Thanks for your help

[LiveOak]

The "TextToNum()" function will ignore all entries except numbers. Subsequent explicit (NumToText()) or implicit conversion to text again will leave the string without the punctuation.

-bd