Wildcards

 

Many of the protection shields and other components included in Avast Business products allow configuring exclusions or blocking specific paths. Wildcards help when you do not know the exact file path or file names of files you want to include or exclude, or when you want to indicate multiple files in a single path. Also, wildcards should be used instead of user/system variables (e.g. %userprofile%, %systemroot%), as these variables are not supported anywhere except in Firewall settings and Ransomware Shield.

Note that not all file paths allow the use of wildcards.

 

Character	Meaning
?	Replaces a single character For example: ab?.html matches the files abc.html, abd.html, abe.html, etc. It will not match the file abc.htm.
*	Replaces zero or more characters For example: *mtl matches the files abc.html and d.html. *txt matches the files abc.txt, x.txt, and xyztxt.

 

Under certain circumstances, you will not get the expected result without using wildcards. For example:

• To exclude all HTML files, type *.htm* into the text box. Typing .html or .htm into the text box will not include any files because no full file name is represented.
• To exclude a folder and its sub-folders, add \* to the end of the folder name, for instance C:\example\*.
• To exclude all files labeled in a certain way on any of your hard drives, include ?:\ in front of the path, for instance ?:\example.exe.

File/Folder Exclusion Examples

Normal file path: C:\Program Files\AVAST Software\Avast\*

Executables regardless of file path: *\example.exe

A folder and all contents in any location: *\AVAST Software\*

Other examples:

• C:\folder\subfolder\filename.ext
• C:\folder\subfolder\*
• \\10.0.0.1\*

Batch Script Files: You may need to also add exclusions for command-line files executed within batch script files detected as a threat by Avast.

Folder exceptions must include the trailing backslash (\) and asterisk (*) to correctly exclude the whole folder and subfolders; otherwise, the exception will be ineffective.

Behavior Shield and Hardened Mode do not support inserting wildcards at the beginning or in the middle of a file path (for example, C:\users\*\application.exe). However, you can still use a wildcard at the end of the path (for instance, C:\users\username\*).

URL Exclusion Examples

To add, for example, https://www.avast.com/ as a URL exclusion, you can use any of the following:

• https://www.avast.com/*
• *.avast.com/*
• www.avast.com/*
• dns://*.avast.com/* (to exclude DNS server in the Real Site component)

URL/DNS exceptions can contain wildcards in the domain, but only the whole domain will be added.

Script Exclusion Examples

Full script path: http://files.avast.com/iavs9x/avastclear.exe

Path using wildcards:

• http://files.avast.com/iavs9x/*
• */avastclear.exe
• htt*://files.avast.com/iavs9x/*