# I find if the title contain ':', it will fails

**URL:** <https://discourse.jabref.org/t/i-find-if-the-title-contain-it-will-fails/2728>\
**Category:** Features\
**Created:** [May 11, 2021, 2:41am UTC](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/i-find-if-the-title-contain-it-will-fails/2728 "2021-05-11T02:41:56Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![xinhongri](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/discourse.jabref.org/xinhongri/32/964_2.png) [@xinhongri](https://discourse.jabref.org/u/xinhongri)\
**Post date:** [May 11, 2021, 2:41am UTC](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/i-find-if-the-title-contain-it-will-fails/2728/1 "2021-05-11T02:41:56Z")

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When I use  
\*\*/._[title]._\.[extension]  
to search the file,  
I find if the title contain ‘:’, it will fails.  
Neither when I want to rename by jabref.  
Could you improve it？  
Thanks.

Similar problem is also proposed by:  
File names containing special characters - Help - Forum - JabRef

> [@File names containing special characters](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/file-names-containing-special-characters/564):
>
> I use the convention “Author year title” as file renaming strategy. Jabref is able to find the files so far as they are stored in the appropriate folder. but, some references contain characters like “/” and “;” in their titles. The files then have names with these special characters. Jabref tend to lose these files. Here is an example: @Article{Laenzlinger2010a, author = {Laenzlinger, Christopher}, title = {The CP/DP parallelism}, File = {Laenzlinger 2010 The CP/DP parallelism.pdf}, Ja…

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**Author:** ![k3KAW8Pnf7mkmdSMPHz2](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/discourse.jabref.org/k3kaw8pnf7mkmdsmphz2/32/1116_2.png) [@k3KAW8Pnf7mkmdSMPHz2](https://discourse.jabref.org/u/k3KAW8Pnf7mkmdSMPHz2)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 4:40pm UTC](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/i-find-if-the-title-contain-it-will-fails/2728/2 "2021-05-17T16:40:42Z")

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Unfortunately, I don’t think `:` can be made usable right now, and I don’t think it will be usable any time soon. If you open the `.bib` file you can see that it is currently used as a separator in the `file` field.

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**Author:** ![xinhongri](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/discourse.jabref.org/xinhongri/32/964_2.png) [@xinhongri](https://discourse.jabref.org/u/xinhongri)\
**Post date:** [May 21, 2021, 2:01am UTC](https://discourse.jabref.org/t/i-find-if-the-title-contain-it-will-fails/2728/3 "2021-05-21T02:01:07Z")

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Maybe there are still ways to solve, I believe that you can make it! 😀