PHP - preg_match() and eregi() not working?

Question

Hey there!

I'm having a bit of a problem trying to validate email adresses using preg_match (or eregi() if that suits better). I've tried several regex patterns now and no matter what i do it doesn't seem to work.

Here's the function:

function validateEmail($email) {

    if(eregi('[a-z||0-9]@[a-z||0-9].[a-z]', $email)){
        return true;
    }

}

Any ideas what's wrong? I've tried putting an exclamation point before the eregi (and preg_match that i used before), and that reversed it all (as expected) but still didn't make it work as it should. I want it to return TRUE if it does not pass the regex.

And i didn't use the same regex when on the preg_match function, i found another one then, cause i know you can't really mix those two. Right?

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

You ought to use the filter extension through filter_var:

filter_var($email, FILTER_VALIDATE_EMAIL);

If you want a regex, don't use a strict rule, or my [email protected] domain will be rejected. Use something like ~[^@]+@(?:[^.]+\.)+[A-Za-z]{2,6}~. Though this will still not allow valid emails like "\@"@example.org.

PS: If you want to know why your regex doesn't work:

• eregi is deprecated, use preg_match instead
• inside [] don't write ||. Simply use [a-z0-9]. || would simply additionally allow the | character
• You forgot the + quantifiers everywhere. Right know every part may have only one character.

With all those things fixed (but please don't use this regex!):

preg_match('~[a-z0-9]+@[a-z0-9]+.[a-z]+~i', $email);

Answer 2

Just to clarify some stuff, ereg is depreciated.

To convert that to preg_match it would be:

if(preg_match('/[a-z||0-9]@[a-z||0-9].[a-z]/', $email)){

Most (I use this term loosely) ereg's just need delimiters (the first and last / ) added to be converted to preg_match.