regex replace href value between " and " for <a> not <link> tags

Question

Using Sublime Text 2, I want to use regex to replace every href value between " and " with a new value.

Example:

<a href="link/to/somewhere.html">

convert to

<a href="#">

But the href has to have a corresponding <a> tag not within a <link> tag.

Answer 1

You can use the following. Use Ctrl + H to open the Search and Replace, enable Regular Expression

Find: (<a[^>]*href=")[^"]*("[^>]*>)
Replace: $1#$2

Alternatively, you can use the \K escape sequence which is little more simpler. \K resets the starting point of the reported match and any previously consumed characters are no longer included.

Find: <a[^>]*href="\K[^"]*
Replace: #

Answer 2

In Sublime Text 2:

Find What:    <a (.+ )?href="([^"]+)"([^>]+)?>
Replace With: <a \1href="#"\3>