Allow only alphanumeric characters, white spaces and hyphen.

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January 27th, 2009, 05:47 AM

srisa

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Allow only alphanumeric characters, white spaces and hyphen.

Hello,

I have come up with this regex for making sure that given string contains only alphanumeric characters or spaces or a hyphen.

php Code:

Original - php Code
$val = $argv[1]; $reg = "#[^a-z0-9\s-]#i"; $count = preg_match($reg, $val, $matches); if ($count > 0){ echo "$val contains invalid characters\n"; print_r($matches); } else{ echo "$val DOES NOT contain invalid characters\n"; echo "count is $count"; }

 
$val = $argv[1];
$reg = "#[^a-z0-9\s-]#i";
$count = preg_match($reg, $val, $matches);
if ($count > 0){
    echo "$val contains invalid characters\n";
    print_r($matches);
}
else{
    echo "$val DOES NOT contain invalid characters\n";
    echo "count is $count";
}

I have tested and it seems okay. I am not well versed with regex, so came here for a confirmation.
If you didn't already know, it is in PHP PCRE.

Thank you.

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January 27th, 2009, 04:55 PM

requinix

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Looks good.

Remember that "\s" includes \n(ewline) \r(eturn) \t(tab) \v(ertical tab) \f(orm feed) and space.

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January 28th, 2009, 04:59 AM

srisa

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Thank you. Is there an expression to allow only space and deny newlines, tabs etc?

January 28th, 2009, 03:44 PM

requinix

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Besides the "expression" you get when you press the spacebar on your keyboard?

January 29th, 2009, 06:07 AM

srisa

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I'm not sure i followed you. I will try to make myself clearer. In terms of keyboard, only alphabets, numbers, hypen and space bar are to be allowed.

January 29th, 2009, 04:22 PM

requinix

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Since \s included any kind of whitespace, your question was what can be used to only represent a space.
And I'm telling you, a space will represent a space.

Code:

#[^a-z0-9 -]#i

Allow only alphanumeric characters, white spaces and hyphen.

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