Techniques for quickly finding words in a phrase...

Hello,

Ok, can anyone help with the following...

I'm also looking to write a SQL query to find a specific string in a target
of words.

the field contains values like 1234 2456 1234a etc.

The problem is that the string must be exact, so while using

WHERE foo ~ '1234';

or

WHERE foo LIKE '1234';

or

WHERE foo ~* '[[:<:]]1234';

will work, it also brings up results with the 1234a value in the field.

I've tried a wide variety of pattern matching with no luck.

any advice?

thanks

carl