Match all phone numbers BUT the ones with 555 in them...

Dev Shed Forums Sponsor:

January 14th, 2009, 07:52 AM

fantom

Up To No Good!

Join Date: Jan 2001

Posts: 78

Time spent in forums: 8 h 2 m 49 sec
Reputation Power: 13

Match all phone numbers BUT the ones with 555 in them...

Ok, I just spent 2 hours looking into manuals, examples, etc and still can't figure this one out... (call me slow, but it's taking me too long to figure something like this out, it's frustrating me now!)

How do I match all phone numbers that don't use the fake 555-something number in them (so all numbers but xxx-555-xxxx will pass).

I've got this so far:

Code:

^\d{3}-\d{3}-\d{4}$

but how do I add that 555 condition in there?

Thanks in advance!

January 14th, 2009, 09:45 AM

ManiacDan

Likely to be eaten by a grue.

Dev Shed God 10th Plane (9500 - 9999 posts)

Join Date: Oct 2006

Location: Pennsylvania, USA

Posts: 9,791

Folding Points: 127430 Folding Title: Super Ultimate Folder - Level 1

Time spent in forums: 2 Months 3 Weeks 14 h 53 m 20 sec
Reputation Power: 6112

The easiest way is to apply a negative lookahead to the hyphen:

PHP Code:


		
			
 $numbers = array("123-456-7890", "212-555-1234", "098-765-4321");

foreach ( $numbers AS $number ) {

    if ( preg_match("/^\d{3}-(?!(555))\d{3}-\d{4}$/", $number) ) {

        echo "{$number} is valid!\n";

    }

}

Your pattern being:

Code:

^\d{3}-(?!(555))\d{3}-\d{4}$

-Dan

__________________
HEY! YOU! Read the New User Guide and Forum Rules

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." -Benjamin Franklin

"The greatest tragedy of this changing society is that people who never knew what it was like before will simply assume that this is the way things are supposed to be." -2600 Magazine, Fall 2002

Think we're being rude? Maybe you asked a bad question or you're a Help Vampire. Trying to argue intelligently? Please read this.

January 14th, 2009, 12:44 PM

fantom

Up To No Good!

Join Date: Jan 2001

Posts: 78

Time spent in forums: 8 h 2 m 49 sec
Reputation Power: 13

Thank you!

I even tried something similar to that, after reading up on the lookaheads, but didn't put the bracket around 555 and that made it unusable in my case. I was so close, yet, so far!

Thanks again for a quick reply!

January 15th, 2009, 01:08 AM

prometheuzz

User 165270

Join Date: Oct 2005

Posts: 497

Time spent in forums: 5 Days 10 h 14 m 35 sec
Reputation Power: 936

Quote:

Originally Posted by fantom

but didn't put the bracket around 555 and that made it unusable in my case.

Then you must have done something else different because these two patterns match the same strings:

Code:

^\d{3}-(?!(555))\d{3}-\d{4}$
^\d{3}-(?!555)\d{3}-\d{4}$

Match all phone numbers BUT the ones with 555 in them...

Developer Shed Advertisers and Affiliates