CODEWITHSUNDEEP
javascriptregex
user1232673
user1232673

Reputation: 41

JavaScript regex valid name

I want to make a JavaScript regular expression that checks for valid names.

I know how to write some seperatly but not combined.

If I use /^([A-Za-z éàë]{2,40})$/, the user could input 2 spaces as a name

If I use /^([A-Za-z]{2,40}[ éàë]{0,40})$/, the user must use 2 letters first and after using space or special char, can't use letters again.

Searched around a bit, but hard to formulate search string for my problem. Any ideas?

Upvotes: 4

Views: 8937

Answers (6)

Itay Grudev
Itay Grudev

Reputation: 7426

I would like to propose a RegEx that would match all latin based languages with their special characters: 

/\A([ áàíóúéëöüñÄĞİŞȘØøğışÐÝÞðýþA-Za-z-']*)\z/

P.S. I've included all characters I could find, but please feel free to edit the answer in case I've missed any.

Upvotes: 2

Santiago G. Marín
Santiago G. Marín

Reputation: 95

Most solutions don't consider the many different names there might be. There can be names with only two character like Al or Bo or someone that writes his name like F. Middlename Lastname.

This RegExp will validate most names but you can optimize it to whatever you want:

/^[a-z\u00C0-\u02AB'´`]+\.?\s([a-z\u00C0-\u02AB'´`]+\.?\s?)+$/i

This will allow:

  • Li Huang Wu
  • Cevahir Özgür
  • Yiğit Aydın
  • Finlay Þunor Boivin
  • Josué Mikko Norris
  • Tatiana Zlata Zdravkov
  • Ariadna Eliisabet O'Taidhg
  • sergej lisette rijnders
  • BRIANA NORMINA HAUPT
  • BihOtZ AmON PavLOv
  • Eoghan Murdo Stanek
  • Filimena J. Van Der Veen
  • D. Blair Wallace

But will not allow:

If the name needs to be capitalized, uppercase, lowercase, trimmed or single spaced, that's a task a formatter should do, not the user.

Upvotes: 4

patocardo
patocardo

Reputation: 83

After 'trim' the input value, The following will math your request only for Latin surnames.

rn = new RegExp("([\w\u00C0-\u02AB']+ ?)+","gi");
m = ln.match(rn);
valid = (m && m.length)? true: false;

Note that I am using '+', instead of '{2,}', that is because some surnames uses just one letter in a separated word like "Ortega y Gasset"

You can see I am not using RegExp.test, this is because that method don't work properly (I don't know why, but it has a high fail-rate, you may see it here:.

In my country, people from non-latin-language countries usually do some translation of their names so the previous RegExp would be enough. However, if you attempt to match any surname in the world, you may add more range of \u#### characters, avoiding to include symbols, numbers or other type. Or perhaps the xregexp library may help you.

And, please, do not forget to test the input in server side, and escaping it before using it in the sql sentences (if you have them)

Upvotes: 0

Thomas
Thomas

Reputation: 181705

Please, please pretty please, don't do this. You will only end up upsetting people by telling them their name is not valid. Several examples of surnames that would be rejected by your scheme: O'Neill, Sørensen, Юдович, 李. Trying to cover all these cases and more is doomed to failure.

Just do something like this:

  • strip leading and trailing blanks
  • collapse consecutive blanks into one space
  • check if the result is not empty

In JavaScript, that would look like:

name = name.replace(/^\s+/, "").replace(/\s+$/, "").replace(/\s+/, " ");
if (name == "") {
  // show error
} else {
  // valid: maybe put trimmed name back into form
}

Upvotes: 14

Dagg Nabbit
Dagg Nabbit

Reputation: 76736

You could do this:

/^([A-Za-zéàë]{2,40} ?)+$/

2-40 characters, and then optionally a space, repeated at least once. This will allow a space at the end, but you could trim it off separately.

Upvotes: 1

Karl Barker
Karl Barker

Reputation: 11341

Why not

var reg= /^([A-Za-z]{2}[ éàëA-Za-z]*)$/;

2 letters, then as many spaces, letters or special characters as you want.

I wouldn't allow spaces in usernames though - it's begging for trouble when you have usernames like 

ab         ba

who's going to remember how many spaces they used?

Upvotes: 1

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