RegEx for hyphen(-)

Hi There,

Can anyone help me to escape the hyphen (-) using RegEx?

I have description field where users are allowed to key-in the following valid entries, but I am getting hit with hyphen (-).

if((__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments') =~ /^[A-Za-z][\w\s = & ?  : ; . , \- _\/ @]+$/) && (length(__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments')) <= 4000))

Thanks in Advance.

Regards,

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kaalraa

Hi There,

Can anyone help me to escape the hyphen (-) using RegEx?

I have description field where users are allowed to key-in the following valid entries, but I am getting hit with hyphen (-).

if((__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments') =~ /^[A-Za-z][\w\s = & ?  : ; . , \- _\/ @]+$/) && (length(__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments')) <= 4000))

Thanks in Advance.

Regards,

Instead, could you please provide your requirement as what is valid and what's not?

ISCBorisB

Hi There,

Can anyone help me to escape the hyphen (-) using RegEx?

I have description field where users are allowed to key-in the following valid entries, but I am getting hit with hyphen (-).

if((__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments') =~ /^[A-Za-z][\w\s = & ?  : ; . , \- _\/ @]+$/) && (length(__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments')) <= 4000))

Thanks in Advance.

Regards,

Something like q(abc - xyz) will match perfectly. Can you provide a sample where your matching fails?

Icebreaker

Hi Boris,

Thanks for your reply.

When I try the following values, it get errored out for '-'

http://jfpdeprod4.eur.nsroot.net/DEGCB/JPS/portal/VisitorHome.do This is a testing =&?():;.,-_/@

Please refer to my validation check.

Regards,

Icebreaker

Hi Achin,

The requirement is that the users can enter A-Z, a-z, and only the special chars like = & ?  : ; . , \\- _\/ @ and it could be a word or a string of chars. The number of chars should be less than or equal to 4000.

I hope the following check is correct!

if((__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments') =~ /^[A-Za-z][\w\s = & ?  : ; . , \\- _\/ @]+$/) && (length(__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments')) <= 4000))
{
return 1;
}
else
{
return 0;
}

Regards,

ISCBorisB

Hi Boris,

Thanks for your reply.

When I try the following values, it get errored out for '-'

http://jfpdeprod4.eur.nsroot.net/DEGCB/JPS/portal/VisitorHome.do This is a testing =&?():;.,-_/@

Please refer to my validation check.

Regards,

That doesn't make any sense whatever...

if((__VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments')... is apparently a WFT Fragment.
Your latest sample shows some syntactically incorrect (perhaps missing question mark after .do) Struts call.
What does the one have to with another?

What does __VALUE__('iw_setwfarg_comments') evaluate to?
If it is 'This is a testing =&?():;.,-_/@' it matches. If it is '&?():;.,-_/@' it would not match because
it does not start with the letter, not because of hyphen. If it is something else, what is it?

Icebreaker

Boris,

Your first statement is correct.

The condition evaluate to 'This is a testing =&?():;.,-_/@' , but it throws an error. If I remove '-', I do not get any error.

Regards,

ISCBorisB

Boris,

Your first statement is correct.

The condition evaluate to 'This is a testing =&?():;.,-_/@' , but it throws an error. If I remove '-', I do not get any error.

Regards,

Try the following "As Is". What does it print?

if (fake__VALUE() =~ m/^[A-Za-z][\w\s = & ? \( \) : ; . , \- _\/ @]+$/) {
   print "Matches\n";
}
else {
   print "Does Not Match\n";
}
sub fake__VALUE {
   return 'This is a testing =&?():;.,-_/@';
}

Adam Stoller

Hi There,

Can anyone help me to escape the hyphen (-) using RegEx?

A hyphen within a character class (within square-brackets) is treated as a hyphen if it is the very first character in the class, or if it is preceded by a backslash.

E.g.:

if ($foo =~ /^[-A-Za-z0-9]+$/) {...}

or:

if ($foo =~ /^[A-Za-z0-9\-]+$/) {...}

If you are embedding a javascript regex within Perl code - you may have to add one or two additional backslashes in order to properly get through the layers of interpolation.

Icebreaker

Thanks very much Fish and Borris.

It worked for me.

Regards,