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Using Masks

Using Masks

Masks are often used in the options of Web Link Validator and in the profile settings to select a group of links, files or when you are searching for some text. Masks include regular characters and the following wildcards: '?' and '*'.

The '?' character stands for a single character, while the '*' character stands for zero or more characters. The mask http://site.com/page?.htm would include the following links:

http://site.com/page1.htm
http://site.com/page2.htm
http://site.com/pagex.htm
http://site.com/pageN.htm

The mask http://site.com/page??.htm would include the following links:

http://site.com/page01.htm
http://site.com/page02.htm
http://site.com/pageNN.htm

Using the '*' character instead of the '?' character expands the number of links matching the mask. page*.html matches all of the following:

http://site.com/page.htm
http://site.com/page1.htm
http://site.com/page012.htm
http://site.com/pageXYZ.htm

The mask http://site.com/* would include all links starting with 'http://site.com/', for example:

http://site.com/page.htm
http://site.com/directory/
http://site.com/directory/page.htm
http://site.com/cgi-bin/login.cgi

A mask like */site.com/* would include all links containing '/site.com/', for example:

http://site.com/page.htm
https://site.com/directory/
ftp://site.com/