Need Regex to be Non-Greedy

Question

Question:  How do I get a regex wildcard to select only between the two nearest elements instead of going on to further similar elements?



I have a VERY long list of names that need to have the last name separated from the rest by a tab character.  In order to accomplish this, I've inserted a placeholder character (#) just before the return of each line, and replaced all spaces in the names with a different placeholder character (@) for my regex to reference.  These names are all first, middle initial, then last, having a space on each side of the middle initial.  So, with my placeholder characters inserted, the list looks like this (short sample):


Edward@C.@Sellner#

James@J.@Megivern#

J.@Philip@Newell#



I need to isolate only the last name between the @ and # placeholders.  When I try and do that, my regex is going to the first @ placeholder, instead of stopping at the second @ placeholder, just before the last name.  Here's what I'm using in my search:

@([\s\S]*?)#

which I would replace with:

(tab)$1#

after which I would convert all placeholders back to their original state.


What should I be doing differently here?
 


Thanks.

Answer 1

You may use

@([^@#]*)#

See the regex demo

Details

• @ - a @ char
• ([^@#]*) - Group 1: 0 or more chars other than @ and #
• # - a # char.

See the regex graph: