wild card
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Related to wildcard: wildcard mask
wild card
1. See wild (sense 4)
2. Computing a symbol that can represent any character or group of characters, as in a filename
Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005
wild card
[′wīld ‚kärd] (computer science)
A symbolic character in a search argument such that any character will satisfy it.
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms, 6E, Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
wild card
(operating system, programming, text)(From card games in
which certain cards, often the joker, can act as any other
card) A special character or character sequence which matches
any character in a string comparison, like ellipsis ("...") in
ordinary written text.
In Unix filenames '?' matches any single character and '*' matches any zero or more characters. In regular expressions, '.' matches any one character and "[...]" matches any one of the enclosed characters.
See also Backus-Naur Form.
In Unix filenames '?' matches any single character and '*' matches any zero or more characters. In regular expressions, '.' matches any one character and "[...]" matches any one of the enclosed characters.
See also Backus-Naur Form.
This article is provided by FOLDOC - Free Online Dictionary of Computing (foldoc.org)
wild cards
Symbols used to represent any value when selecting specific files. In DOS, Windows and Unix, the asterisk (*) represents any collection of characters, and the question mark (?) represents a single character. In SQL, the percent sign (%) and underscore (_) are used for matching text. Note the following examples:DOS and Windows (case insensitive) *.gif .gif or .GIF extension a*.gif beginning with "a" or "A" boot.* all files named "BooT" any mix upper/lower case *.d* extensions starting with "d" or "D" ?abc 1ABC, 2abc, etc. ??abc 10ABC, xxabc, etc. Windows only (case insensitive) *t.jpg JPEG files ending with "T" Unix only (case sensitive) *.jpg .jpg extension *.JPG .JPG extension a*.jpg beginning with "a" A*.jpg beginning with "A" boot.* all files named "boot" BOOT.* all files named "BOOT" ?abc 1abc, xabc, etc. ??ABC 10ABC, XXABC, etc. SQL Good% begining with "Good" _bcd any name followed by "bcd"
wildcard mask
A coding system used with access control lists to identify IP addresses. A line entry in the list contains a command, an IP address and a mask that references the IP address. Although access list commands are cryptic, an English translation of a line entry might be "deny entry to packets with these addresses."The mask is a binary pattern that contains the same number of bits as the IP address. Each 0 bit in the mask means that the corresponding bit in the IP address must match exactly. A 1 indicates that the bit does not have to match and can be ignored. For example, in order to stipulate a specific IP address, that address would be accompanied by a wildcard mask of 0.0.0.0. To refer to all packets with Class A addresses in the 10.10.x.x range, the wildcard mask would be 0.0.255.255.
The Opposite of the Subnet Mask
Whereas a 0 bit in a wildcard mask means "match the bits," a 0 in a subnet mask means "do not match." Thus, a wildcard mask of 0.0.0.255 is the equivalent of a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0. See access control list, subnet mask and IP address. See also wild cards.
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