Wildcard Expressions

Wildcard expressions use the familiar wildcards * and ? to specify groups of files, e.g. *.pdf to specify a group of files with the PDF extension. However, FileLocator Pro extends the normal Wildcard functionality with some additional special characters:

Character	Description	Example
*	Matches zero or more characters	Tower*London - file/folder with Tower followed by London in their name.
?	Matches any single character	*.as?x - files with a four letter extensions that begin with AS and end X, e.g. Page.aspx or Home.ascx.
<	Start of file indicator	<New - file/folder must begin with New, eg. New York Trip.txt but not My New Recipes.
>	End of file indicator	LA> - file/folder must end in LA, eg. Parks in LA OR Details.SLA but not LAMP.
;	Expands search by adding another allowable name/group	.pdf;.txt;*.doc - files with PDF, TXT and DOC extension.
:	Restricts search to only those with a specified name/group	.pdf;.doc:London - PDF or DOC files that have London in their name.
NOT:	Excludes a name/group from the search	NOT:.dll;.exe;*.sys - all files except DLL, EXE, and SYS files
\|	Concatenate multiple search expressions	.pdf:London\|.txt:Tower - PDF files with London in their name OR TXT files with Tower in their name.
"	Used to either quote semi-colon ';' character or specify word boundary	"LA" - file/folder with the word LA in their name, eg. LA Flight details.txt but not LAMP.txt.

Note: In earlier versions of the product Wildcard expressions used to be referred to as DOS Expressions.

Searching For	Wildcard Expression
Files/folders without any extension	*.
Only files/folders with the specific name Area	<area>
PNG, JPG, or BMP files with the word France in them	.png;.jpg;*.bmp:France
MP3 files with the word Rolling AND Stone in them	*.mp3:Rolling:Stone
PDF files with either the word London OR Tower in them	*.pdf:London;Tower
All files that are not EXE or DLL files with the word Flower in the name	NOT:.exe;.dll:Flower
Any TXT file with a semi-colon in it	";.txt"

Wildcards