You have a typo in your "(?<City>.{30)" - a missing }
Anyway, this works a treat with the caveat that the target string has to be
the expected length (442) or longer.
On my machine 10000 takes 1 second give or take a few milliseconds and
100000 iterations takes 10 seconds give or take a few milliseconds. It is
fair to say that, as writ and on my machine, as a parser it will handle
approx 1000 records per second.
So, I stand educated, you can do rudimentary parsing with Regex so long as
the expression is very carefully constructed.
Dim _s As String = "ACarrierID<16 spaces>" & _
"LastName<52 spaces>" & _
"FirstName<21 spaces>" & _
"MiddleName<5 spaces>" & _
"Addr1<55 spaces>" & _
"Addr2<55 spaces>" & _
"City<26 spaces>" & _
"StZip<7 spaces>" & _
"BenefitOption<47 spaces>" & _
"EmployerGroup OptionEfHPEffDatTermDate" & _
"SDOB<5 spaces>" & _
"SSN<6 spaces>" & _
"Phone<7 spaces>" & _
"EmployerHeadOfHouPM"
Dim _exp As String = "(?<ActionCode>.{1})" & _
"(?<CarrierID>.{25})" & _
"(?<LastName>.{60})" & _
"(?<FirstName>.{30})" & _
"(?<MiddleName>.{15})" & _
"(?<Addr1>.{60})" & _
"(?<Addr2>.{60})" & _
"(?<City>.{30})" & _
"(?<State>.{2})" & _
"(?<Zip>.{10})" & _
"(?<BenefitOption>.{60})" & _
"(?<EmployerGroup>.{15})" & _
"(?<OptionEffDate>.{8})" & _
"(?<HPEffDate>.{8})" & _
"(?<TermDate>.{8})" & _
"(?<Sex>.{1})" & _
"(?<DOB>.{8})" & _
"(?<SSN>.{9})" & _
"(?<Phone>.{12})" & _
"(?<EmployerGroupAnivDate>.{8})" & _
"(?<HeadOfHouse>.{9})" & _
"(?<PrimaryStatus>.{1})" & _
"(?<MaritalStatus>.{1})"
Dim r As Regex = New Regex(_exp)
Dim m As Match = r.Match(_s)
Dim _sInActionCode As String = m.Groups("ActionCode").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInCarrierID As String = m.Groups("CarrierID").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInLastName As String = m.Groups("LastName").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInFirstName As String = m.Groups("FirstName").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInMiddleName As String = m.Groups("MiddleName").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInAddr1 As String = m.Groups("Addr1").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInAddr2 As String = m.Groups("Addr2").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInCity As String = m.Groups("City").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInState As String = m.Groups("State").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInZip As String = m.Groups("Zip").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInBenefitOption As String = m.Groups("BenefitOption").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInEmployerGroup As String = m.Groups("EmployerGroup").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInOptionEffDate As String = m.Groups("OptionEffDate").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInHPEffDate As String = m.Groups("OptionEffDate").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInTermDate As String = m.Groups("HPEffDate").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInSex As String = m.Groups("TermDate").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInDOB As String = m.Groups("DOB").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInSSN As String = m.Groups("SSN").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInPhone As String = m.Groups("Phone").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInEmployerGroupAnivDate As String =
m.Groups("EmployerGroupAnivDate").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInHeadOfHouse As String = m.Groups("HeadOfHouse").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInPrimaryStatus As String = m.Groups("PrimaryStatus").ToString.Trim
Dim _sInMaritalStatus As String = m.Groups("MaritalStatus").ToString.Trim
Console.WriteLine("_sInActionCode = " & _sInActionCode)
Console.WriteLine("_sInCarrierID = " & _sInCarrierID)
Console.WriteLine("_sInLastName = " & _sInLastName)
Console.WriteLine("_sInFirstName = " & _sInFirstName)
Console.WriteLine("_sInMiddleName = " & _sInMiddleName)
Console.WriteLine("_sInAddr1 = " & _sInAddr1)
Console.WriteLine("_sInAddr2 = " & _sInAddr2)
Console.WriteLine("_sInCity = " & _sInCity)
Console.WriteLine("_sInState = " & _sInState)
Console.WriteLine("_sInZip = " & _sInZip)
Console.WriteLine("_sInBenefitOption = " & _sInBenefitOption)
Console.WriteLine("_sInEmployerGroup = " & _sInEmployerGroup)
Console.WriteLine("_sInOptionEffDate = " & _sInOptionEffDate)
Console.WriteLine("_sInHPEffDate = " & _sInHPEffDate)
Console.WriteLine("_sInTermDate = " & _sInTermDate)
Console.WriteLine("_sInSex = " & _sInSex)
Console.WriteLine("_sInDOB = " & _sInDOB)
Console.WriteLine("_sInSSN = " & _sInSSN)
Console.WriteLine("_sInPhone = " & _sInPhone)
Console.WriteLine("_sInEmployerGroupAnivDate = " &
_sInEmployerGroupAnivDate)
Console.WriteLine("_sInHeadOfHouse = " & _sInHeadOfHouse)
Console.WriteLine("_sInPrimaryStatus = " & _sInPrimaryStatus)
Console.WriteLine("_sInMaritalStatus = " & _sInMaritalStatus)
Let me know if it helps or you need help with one of