"abcdefg"*2	returns abcdefgabcdefg (two times the string)
"abcdefg"*-1	returns gfedcba (the string is inversed)
"abcdefg"*1.5	returns abcdefgabc

### Transforming a string with trailing modifers If you follow a string expression a$ by brackets containing a modifier list in the format: *a$* [*modifierlist*] you can transform the string in several useful ways. The *modifierlist* can be any of the following characters:

+	convert lower case letters to upper case
-	convert upper case letters to lower case
<	strip leading spaces (and control characters)
>	strip trailing spaces (and control characters)
~	strip bit 7 (More about bit 7 in Chapter 23) terminator from last character of string
^	add bit 7 terminator to last character of string
(f$,r$)	replace any occurrences of characters present in f$ with the corresponding character from r$ (or delete if there is no corresponding character)

The order of the modifiers is unimportant, except for **(f$,r$)** which, if present, must be the final modifier. The following examples demonstrate what can ne achieved: ``` " Hello There! "[<+->]" ``` gives: **hELLO tHERE!** as trailing and leading spaces are stripped via < and >and all lower case letters are converted to upper case with the + and upper case to lower case with the -. ``` "My typewriter is broken"[("nore","dro")] ``` returns **My typwoito is borkd** as *r$* doesn't have a corresponding letter for the **e** of *f$* so all of them are deleted, all **o** are replaced by **r** and all **r** are replaced by **o** Note that it is possible to slice a modified string, or modify a sliced string, since both **()** and **[]** continue to be evaluated following a string argument until there are no further opening parentheses or brackets. For example: ``` a$(5)[-](3 TO 7)[<] ``` is perfectly valid. ### Tokenisation of strings If need be, (for example to easily prepare strings to be passed to *functions* **VAL** or **VAL$** – See next *Chapter*) we can tokenise, that is to convert *NextBASIC* reserved words to their single code equivalents (tokens) – without syntax checking– the contents of a string expression *a$* by enclosing it in *braces* **{}** like so: **{a$}** For example:

{"sin (pi/4)"}	returns a string "SIN (PI/4)", including the tokens SIN (code 178) and PI (code 167)
VAL{"sin (pi/4)"}	gives 0.7071