Remove escape characters _____from message

Marcus,

I don’t know if you are aware of it but those escaped characters all mean something and probably should be escaped proeprly by the reeceiving system so the text does not lose meaning. For example the E should be converted to the escape character defined in MSH-2 (probably a single by observation) and the .br should be replaced by a new-line.

You may have already considered that and the receving system does not have the ability to return the escaped characters to their original meaning and thus wants them removed.

If so, you are on the correct track but probably need a more complex regsub argument set – you may also be able to use the string map to your satisfaction.

Marcus;

It looks like the vendor is using either html or rtf tags in an xml style, you can filter them out or find out if your receiving application can use them.  In the receving application needs only text results then filter then out, if your receiving application can receive formated text then convert the information.

filter out

regsub -all “\E\|\.br\…” $xlateOutVals “” xlateOutVals

translate

|________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

and                      Notes

Marcus,

Actually it appears the sending vendor is actually following the HL/7 standard and the Receiving system is not. I don’t see any XML or HTML here at all.

Ask the receiving system if they cannot follow the standard (it is just about the only part of the HL/7 v2 standard that is not up to individual interpretation) can they tolerate having the separator characters and line break in the message. If they can (it does not break their parser) then you can convert those to their separator characters (E is , T is & (typically), etc.) and the .br to new-line on the outbound TPS prior to delivery.

For example:

|________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________E\.br\E and E\.br\EHTP Notes

after proper substition would be:

|________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

and

H&P Notes

Where is the actual hex for new-line.

You can see H&P Notes makes sense where HP Notes does not.

If they cannot tolerate the separators you can agree on some substiitution that makes sense like substituting ‘ and ‘ for T so that HTP reads H and P.