I am building a tool to take some user input and then automatically set up directories and other tasks based on the user input. I'm trying to make sure that the input is something that can be used. I want to make sure the input matches all alphanumeric (no problem), the underscore character (no problem), and the dash "-". If I use the \W+ regex, it works fine except on the dash. I need to expand the regex somehow, but I am at a loss right now on how to do this. Below is the snippet I've been working on:

use strict;
use warnings;

foreach my $dir (<DATA>) {
chomp $dir;

print "DIR: $dir\n";

if ( $dir =~ /\W+/ ) {
     print "\t$dir is not clean.\n";
} else {
     print "\t$dir is clean.\n";
}#close if

}#close foreach

__DATA__
test
1234
test_1234
test-1234
test 1234
test?1234
test+1234
test.1234

[download]

The first four items should return as "Clean" while the last four should return as "Not Clean". I've tried reversing to match Word (\w+) but because there are valid characters in all the items, they all return as "Clean". Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks.

In reply to Regex Problem by nimdokk

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.