Simple Regular expression question

I have a large malformed test HTML document which I need to get the numbers out of:

I'd like to get the primary ratio out. I'm using this regular expression:

(?<=Primary ratio</TD><TD>--</TD><TD>).*(?=</TD>)

On this string:

Primary ratio</TD><TD>--</TD><TD>10.52</TD><TD>14.97</TD><TD></TD></TR><TR align='right'><TD align='left'>Flip Ratio</TD><TD>-122.81</TD><TD>1.13</TD><TD>1.50</TD><TD></TD></TR><TR align='right'><TD align='left'>Secondary Ratio</TD><TD>--</TD><TD>0.70</TD><TD>0.70</TD><TD></TD></TR><TR align='right'><TD a开发者_如何学编程lign='left'>RM Ratio</TD><TD>--</TD><TD>2.02</TD>

But I get this as a result:

10.52</TD><TD>14.97</TD><TD></TD></TR><TR align='right'><TD align='left'>Flip Ra
tio</TD><TD>-122.81</TD><TD>1.13</TD><TD>1.50</TD><TD></TD></TR><TR align='right
'><TD align='left'>Secondary Ratio</TD><TD>--</TD><TD>0.70</TD><TD>0.70</TD><TD>
</TD></TR><TR align='right'><TD align='left'>RM Ratio</TD><TD>--</TD><TD>2.02

I don't want that, I just want the 10.52 number in the first tag.

I mean, it found the start of the string perfectly, but it didn't find the first . What am I doing wrong?

Replace .* with .*? near the end of your regex; that should stop it from matching too much. Normally it'll much as much as possible that fits the pattern, by adding the ?, you ask it to match as little as possible instead.

Use an HTML parser instead of a RegEx - the HTML Agility Pack is a good one.

In general, regular expressions are not suitable for usage with HTML, as HTML is not a regular language. This is particularly true if you are working with HTML from different sources. See here for a compelling demonstration.