Escaping * character in java

Question

I am trying to execute the following operation on a String.

    if (combatLog.contains("//*name//*")) {
        combatLog.replaceAll("//*name//*",glad.target.name);
    }

The slashes are my attempt to escape the *, as it doesn't work without them. I have also tried one slash, and slashes on contains or replaceAll individually. Thanks

Answer 1

replaceAll() (counter-intuitively) takes a regex, not a string.
To escape a character for a regex, you need a double-backslash (doubled to escape the backslash from the string literal).

However, you don't want a regex. You should simply call replace() instead, which won't need any escaping.