in reply to Re: regex to validate e-mail addresses and phone numbers
in thread regex to validate e-mail addresses and phone numbers

b10m,
While I agree with your suggestion of Email::Valid in principal, it may not be the right solution for the task at hand. I am guessing there is more to this than was originally stated. It might be best to first ask some simple questions:

  • Am I validating inbound, outbound, or bi-directional addresses?
  • Does my inbound MTA comply with the RFCs? If not is it more strict, more relaxed, or bits and pieces of both?
  • Do I care if it is valid? If it "looks" like a spammer, I want to drop it regardless.

    It may turn out that a home-grown regex is the right way to go, it may turn out that Email::Valid or Email::Valid::Loose is the way to go. It may even turn out that the best solution is SpamAssasin.

    Cheers - L~R

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    Re: Re: Re: regex to validate e-mail addresses and phone numbers
    by makar (Novice) on Feb 10, 2004 at 16:37 UTC
      Forgive my newbieness in asking, but I was taught that using a premade package like Valid is the best solution 99% of the time, and that most of the 1% was for when space/cpu and such were at issue.

      So I am wondering what would make you lean towards a home-grown solution over the module?

      Thank you in advance. ~Adam Marquis
    		[reply]
        makar,
        Have you ever heard of an XY problem? It is when someone asks how to do Y when they really want to do X. They ask how to do Y because they believe it is the best way to accomplish X. The people that they ask go through many iterations of "try this", followed by "that won't work because of". I am not suggesting to use something other than Email::Valid if that truly is what is desired. What I am saying that is depending on the circumstance, other solutions may be the way to go.

        For instance, say the problem is receiving spam messages from addresses that include % symbols and @ signs. You believe that it isn't a valid email address since you have never seen it before. You use Email::Valid and you find out that it is very valid and is a common trick for open-relays. Hmmmm - what do I do? You create your own regex that says I do not care if this is valid, no legitimate mail I receive uses this syntax so I am going to get rid of it.

        Cheers - L~R

    		[reply]
          Understood, thank you very much.
    		[reply]

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