CODEWITHSUNDEEP
javascripthtmlregexstring
elgis
elgis

Reputation: 498

TypeError: pattern.test is not a function

I'm writing a register form which has a ton of javascript included. While writing the basic functions to check the format of certain strings, I came across this problem (I've tried to solve it by myself but no luck there). In this simplified version I have three functions: one to check the format of phone number, second to check the format of email and third to combine those two functions to make it more clear. Here's the code:

<html>
<head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <script>
        function filterPhone(phone){
            var pattern = "/^(()?\d{3}())?(-|\s)?\d{3}(-|\s)?\d{4}$/";
            return pattern.test(phone);
        }

        function filterEmail(email) {
            var regex = /^([a-zA-Z0-9_.+-])+\@(([a-zA-Z0-9-])+\.)+([a-zA-Z0-9]{2,4})+$/;
            return regex.test(email);
        }

        function checkForm(){
            var puh = document.getElementById("puh").value;
        var email = document.getElementById("email").value;
            if(filterPhone(puh) && filterEmail(email)){
                alert("It works");
                return true;
            } else {
                alert("Check the format!");
                return false;
            }
        }
    </script>
</head>
<body>
<form method="post" action="" name="regForm" onsubmit="return checkForm()">
    <input type="text" name="puh" id="puh" placeholder="Phonenumber"><br>
    <input type="text" name="email" id="email" placeholder="Email address"><br>
    <input type="submit" value="Check!">
</form>
</body>
</html>

If I only use the function filterEmail it works fine but when I use them both (or even only the filterPhone!) it gives me an error: "TypeError: pattern.test is not a function" ("pattern" referring to the first function's (filterPhone) variable name called pattern). I've tried using exec() instead of test() and changing the regex-pattern, neither have worked. This is rather weird since the syntax seems to be correct. Why could be the reason?

Upvotes: 42

Views: 79742

Answers (4)

Joel Grayson
Joel Grayson

Reputation: 197

Also, make sure to write /pattern/.test("string") as opposed to "string".test(/pattern/).

Upvotes: 4

Waleed93
Waleed93

Reputation: 1300

Encountered a similar issue.

Solution: use .match() instead of .test() method

Upvotes: 6

Gaurang Tandon
Gaurang Tandon

Reputation: 6753

Your pattern holds a string, and not a regular expression.

Make it var pattern = /^(()?\d{3}())?(-|\s)?\d{3}(-|\s)?\d{4}$/; (without quotes)

Upvotes: 18

thefourtheye
thefourtheye

Reputation: 239513

Your pattern must be RegEx literal (double quotes around that should not be there) like this

var pattern = /^(()?\d{3}())?(-|\s)?\d{3}(-|\s)?\d{4}$/;

Otherwise you need to use RegExp object, with proper escaping for \, like this

var pattern = new RegExp("^(()?\\d{3}())?(-|\\s)?\\d{3}(-|\\s)?\\d{4}$");

Upvotes: 81

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