Rails - Mar 2007 - Validating no spaces in field

All,

I''ve never been much of a regex wrangler, and learning rails at the
same time isn''t helping.

I want to create a validation that fails if a user tries to create a
username with spaces.  But I can''t seem to get the right
validates_format_of regex going.

Can anyone help with this simple question?

Thanks!
Andrew


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Hi,

you can simply try yourString.include?(" ") with the
params[:yourString]
if it is  a form parameter.

Sayoyo



andrew.ohnstad-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org
wrote:
> All,
> 
> I''ve never been much of a regex wrangler, and learning rails at
the
> same time isn''t helping.
> 
> I want to create a validation that fails if a user tries to create a
> username with spaces.  But I can''t seem to get the right
> validates_format_of regex going.
> 
> Can anyone help with this simple question?
> 
> Thanks!
> Andrew

-- 
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.

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validates_format_of :username, :with => /^\S+$/

but that''s still probably too open for a username (it''ll allow
"u
$ern4m3" for instance)

Most of the time, usernames are restricted to:

validates_format_of :username, :with => /^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]{2,10}$/

(usernames starting with a letter, followed by 2 or more letters or
digits up to 10, min username length = 3, max username length = 11)

here are a few links that explain the syntax concisely:
 - http://www.math.hokudai.ac.jp/~gotoken/ruby/ruby-uguide/uguide05.html
 - http://www.rubyist.net/~slagell/ruby/regexp.html

On Mar 12, 9:54 pm,
"andrew.ohns...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org"
<andrew.ohns...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> All,
>
> I''ve never been much of a regex wrangler, and learning rails at
the
> same time isn''t helping.
>
> I want to create a validation that fails if a user tries to create a
> username with spaces.  But I can''t seem to get the right
> validates_format_of regex going.
>
> Can anyone help with this simple question?
>
> Thanks!
> Andrew

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Thank you so much, that did the trick perfectly!

And double thanks for teaching a man to fish.  I think I might be able
to write a simple regex of my own now!

Thanks again!!!

---A

On Mar 12, 1:27 pm, "eden li"
<eden...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> validates_format_of :username, :with => /^\S+$/
>
> but that''s still probably too open for a username (it''ll
allow "u
> $ern4m3" for instance)
>
> Most of the time, usernames are restricted to:
>
> validates_format_of :username, :with => /^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]{2,10}$/
>
> (usernames starting with a letter, followed by 2 or more letters or
> digits up to 10, min username length = 3, max username length = 11)
>
> here are a few links that explain the syntax concisely:
>  -http://www.math.hokudai.ac.jp/~gotoken/ruby/ruby-uguide/uguide05.html
>  -http://www.rubyist.net/~slagell/ruby/regexp.html
>
> On Mar 12, 9:54 pm,
"andrew.ohns...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org"
>
> <andrew.ohns...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org> wrote:
> > All,
>
> > I''ve never been much of a regex wrangler, and learning rails
at the
> > same time isn''t helping.
>
> > I want to create a validation that fails if a user tries to create a
> > username with spaces.  But I can''t seem to get the right
> > validates_format_of regex going.
>
> > Can anyone help with this simple question?
>
> > Thanks!
> > Andrew

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While I think that your regex is smokin'' hot, I do think you might be
better
served [at least on the error messages front] by two validations there:

validates_format_of :username, :with => /^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]*$/, :message
=> "can only contain letters and numbers" # Or something
validates_length_of, :minimum => 2, :maximum => 10, :too_short =>
"must be
at least 2 characters", :too_long => "cannot be longer than 10
characters"

that way you''ll have separate error messages for each problem rather
than
having to lump them all in together. You way _does_ work though. I''m
just
trying to offer a helpful hint.

RSL

On 3/12/07, eden li <eden.li-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:

validates_format_of :username, :with =>
/^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]{2,10}$/
>
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Russell,

I agree and my model already had a validates_length_of so I modified
the proposed regex to eliminate the length check.

Discussing this with my partner we decided to allow numbers, letters,
and underscore (_) so I am going to try the regex
/^[a-zA-Z0-9_]*$/

We don''t care if the first character is a letter, number, or
underscore, only that these are the only characters allowed anywhere
in the username.  So "_username", "user_name", and
"1user_name" should
all be valid.

Think this should work?  I don''t have access to the site to test it
until I get home tonight.

I had never noticed that validates_length_of supports two error
messages, one for too short, and one for too long.  I''ll have to
implement that in my code tonight as well.

Now if I could only find a non-ugly way to sort the error messages so
they match the order of the form fields I''d be all set. :(

On Mar 13, 6:36 am, "Russell Norris"
<sco...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> While I think that your regex is smokin'' hot, I do think you might
be better
> served [at least on the error messages front] by two validations there:
>
> validates_format_of :username, :with => /^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]*$/,
:message
> => "can only contain letters and numbers" # Or something
> validates_length_of, :minimum => 2, :maximum => 10, :too_short =>
"must be
> at least 2 characters", :too_long => "cannot be longer than 10
characters"
>
> that way you''ll have separate error messages for each problem
rather than
> having to lump them all in together. You way _does_ work though.
I''m just
> trying to offer a helpful hint.
>
> RSL
>
> On 3/12/07, eden li <eden...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
>
> validates_format_of :username, :with => /^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]{2,10}$/
>
>
>
> - Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

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It''s not [that] hard to roll your own version of error_messages_on.
Something like

def error_messages_hacked(instance, *order)
  return if instance.errors.empty?
  dummy = order.map do |attribute|
    "#{instance} #{instance.errors_on(attribute)}"
  end.flatten
  # Do any HTML styling you want on dummy
  # which will be a collection of error message strings
end

<%= error_messages_hacked @user, :name, :email, :whatever -%>

That''s pretty not ugly, right?

On 3/13/07, andrew.ohnstad-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org
<andrew.ohnstad-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
>
>
> Russell,
>
> I agree and my model already had a validates_length_of so I modified
> the proposed regex to eliminate the length check.
>
> Discussing this with my partner we decided to allow numbers, letters,
> and underscore (_) so I am going to try the regex
> /^[a-zA-Z0-9_]*$/
>
> We don''t care if the first character is a letter, number, or
> underscore, only that these are the only characters allowed anywhere
> in the username.  So "_username", "user_name", and
"1user_name" should
> all be valid.
>
> Think this should work?  I don''t have access to the site to test
it
> until I get home tonight.
>
> I had never noticed that validates_length_of supports two error
> messages, one for too short, and one for too long.  I''ll have to
> implement that in my code tonight as well.
>
> Now if I could only find a non-ugly way to sort the error messages so
> they match the order of the form fields I''d be all set. :(
>
> On Mar 13, 6:36 am, "Russell Norris"
<sco...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org> wrote:
> > While I think that your regex is smokin'' hot, I do think you
might be
> better
> > served [at least on the error messages front] by two validations
there:
> >
> > validates_format_of :username, :with => /^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]*$/,
> :message
> > => "can only contain letters and numbers" # Or something
> > validates_length_of, :minimum => 2, :maximum => 10, :too_short
=> "must
> be
> > at least 2 characters", :too_long => "cannot be longer
than 10
> characters"
> >
> > that way you''ll have separate error messages for each problem
rather
> than
> > having to lump them all in together. You way _does_ work though.
I''m
> just
> > trying to offer a helpful hint.
> >
> > RSL
> >
> > On 3/12/07, eden li
<eden...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org> wrote:
> >
> > validates_format_of :username, :with =>
/^[a-zA-Z][a-z0-9A-Z]{2,10}$/
> >
> >
> >
> > - Hide quoted text -
> >
> > - Show quoted text -
>
>
> >
>
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