PowerShell - Substring regex

Question

I need to search a file for any string that contains the sub-strings "ME" and "SW", in this order, with any character (even non-alphanumerical), before, between and after them.

So far this line works for me:

*select-string -path "..path" -pattern ME*

But, when I try the regex [.]*ME[.]*SW[.]* it returns null.

Also, when using [.]*ME[.]* it works.

[.] will match a literal ., remove the brackets in order for it to match any character — arco444
– arco444, Commented Jun 11, 2018 at 11:42

David Cros Piezzoli · Accepted Answer · 2018-06-11 12:14:04Z

4

You should try this....

ME.*SW

edited Jun 11, 2018 at 12:14

answered Jun 11, 2018 at 11:38

David Cros Piezzoli

3051 silver badge3 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

3 Comments

abg Over a year ago

Thank you, it worked. Could you explain the difference, I'm a little confused.

David Cros Piezzoli Over a year ago

The dot symbol is a metacharacter which matches any character excluding line break characters. But if you use it inside brackets it matches only a dot character. For example : AA[.] matches the string "AA.", but not the string "AAA" and AA. matches the string "AA." and also the string "AAA" Hope it helps

user6811411 Over a year ago

The .* before and after ME.*SW are redundant.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

PowerShell - Substring regex

1 Answer 1

3 Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

3 Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related