How to remove wildcard in string?

Question

I'm trying the following...

$string = "*abc*"
$string = $string -replace "*",""
Write-Host $string

but get the following error

Regular expression pattern is not valid: *.
At C:\Scripts\Tests\testing.ps1:3 char:1
+ $string = $string -replace "*",""
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (*:String) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvalidRegularExpression

I've tried -replace, .replace, .trim, but none of them are working because they are all reading it as a regular expression. I've also tried "`*", and it still doesn't work.

Anyone know how to make the system not to read as a regex?

Possible duplicate of [Reference - What does this regex mean?](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/22937618/reference-what-does-this-regex-mean) — Matt, Dec 22 '15 at 17:53

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 22 '15 at 17:21

2

Try using \ to escape it instead of the backtick.

answered Dec 22 '15 at 17:21

Nate

802
1
8
28

It's confirmed this also works, however backslashes are risky since the regex for removing whitespaces are `\s`. I think the square brackets are the safer bet. I'll still mark your answer is being correct though. – Fiddle Freak Dec 22 '15 at 17:33

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 22 '15 at 16:37

1

Could you try this ?

$string = $string.replace('*','')

Hope it will work !

answered Dec 22 '15 at 16:37

Vincent G

361
1
4
22

1

This is the answer that avoids issues with wildcards and does work. – Matt Dec 22 '15 at 17:54

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 22 '15 at 16:48

1

You can use square brackets to remove the characters.

$string = $string -replace '[*]', ''

answered Dec 22 '15 at 16:48

dfundako

8,022
3
18
34

Thanks this is working. Using the `\*` also worked, but I noticed a bug if the string involves spaces. I think your way is much better. Thanks again :) – Fiddle Freak Dec 22 '15 at 17:23

Matt · Answer 4 · 2015-12-22T18:05:35.517

If you don't want the system to use regex then you should not be using a regex operator like -replace. The string method .Replace() would work just as fine. You said .Trim() did not work either but indeed it does. Possibly and issue with your real data as supposed to your example in the question.

PS C:\temp> "'{0}'" -f "*abc*".replace("*","")
'abc'

PS C:\temp> "'{0}'" -f "*abc*".Trim("* ")
'abc'

PS C:\temp> "'{0}'" -f "*  abc* ".Trim("* ")
'abc'

How to remove wildcard in string?

4 Answers4