Reg expression for all except path containing "iconic"

[Brian]

Hello,

I need to select files in two steps: 1) using Select by Location, preserve the files in a certain folder and all subfolders. This works fine. 2) Then to further refine, I need to unselect those that do NOT have the word iconic in their path. I chose Select by text pattern, change the Column Name to Path, select the 'Use Regular Expressions' checkbox, put (?!iconic) as the Pattern to match and click Unmark. The result is that all selections are removed. What am I doing wrong?

Thanks,
Brian

[DV]

That regex selects everything - I think just "iconic" then unmark should work to unmark everything that contains that phrase.

[Brian]

I need the opposite, unmark those that do NOT contain the phrase.

[DV]

How about:

Code: Select all

^(?!.*iconic)

[Brian]

That worked! Thanks DV.

[Brian]

DV, sorry to trouble you again but could you give the expression that would unmark those that do NOT contain the word iconic EXCEPT for those that contain the word cfa (meaning leave their marked state alone).

[DV]

That's a tricky one- haven't worked it out yet!