How can I exclude the first group from the regex?

Question

I would like to exclude the first group from my regex so that the result is no longer inside. Could someone help me please?

This is my regex: href="(.*)(?=(?:"))

And that for example the text: fdlasjfkldjfksdjhref="contact"adskldfjaskfjak

Now I want this result: contact

I have no Idea what I do wrong...

I thank you now for your help!

Possible duplicate of [Regex: C# extract text within double quotes](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/13024073/regex-c-sharp-extract-text-within-double-quotes) — Ryanas, Jun 27 '18 at 11:12
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/13024073/regex-c-sharp-extract-text-within-double-quotes may be duplicate — Ratan Uday Kumar, Jun 27 '18 at 11:18
Try [`(?<=href=")[^"]+(?=")`](https://regex101.com/r/pg9j57/1) — The fourth bird, Jun 27 '18 at 11:20
@ProgrammingBeginner Glad it worked. I have added an answer with an explanation. — The fourth bird, Jun 27 '18 at 11:38

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 27 '18 at 11:37

You could use a positive lookbehind (?<= to assert what is on the left side is href=", then match not a double quote using a negated character class [^"]+followed by a positive lookahead (?= to assert that what follows is a double quote.

(?<=href=")[^"]+(?=")

score -1 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 27 '18 at 11:23

I find this site useful to test out regex and matching patterns http://www.regexplanet.com/advanced/dotnet/index.html

I input your expression and test string examples and it shows the .NET string version needs to be

"href=\"(.*)(?=(?:\"))"

Note the escaped double quotes.

Groups[1] returns your desired text

How can I exclude the first group from the regex?

2 Answers2