Validating DOB using ereg?

jonno946

Hi There, im trying to validate the date of birth field on my registration form, however i keep getting my error message even if i enter a valid date!? If anyone can point me in the right direction that would be great.

Thanks :o)

// Check DOB Is Valid.
if (!ereg ("([0-9]{2})/([0-9]{1,2})/([0-9]{1,2})", $date)) {
print "The DOB You Have Entered Is Invalid! This Must be in the Form of DD/MM/YYYY.";
exit;
}

pyro

There are a few syntactical errors, and a few regexp errors with yours, if you want to match DD/MM/YYYY. Try this one (I also used preg_match)

$dob = "10/01/1984";
if (!preg_match("/^(\\d{2}[\\/]{1}){2}\\d{4}/",$dob)) {
	echo "The DOB You Have Entered Is Invalid! This Must be in the Form of DD/MM/YYYY."; 
	exit();
}

jonno946

Hi There,

Thanks for the reply!

That seems to check the format of the date fine, but i really wanted it to make sure that:

a. The month contains a character no higher than 12.
b. The day field contains a character no higher than 31
c. the year is within 19XX - 20XX

Any ideas?

pyro

This would probably be the best way to do that. Note, however, that it will allow dates such as 1/1/2003 or 01/1/2003... If that can't be allowed, you will have to check the length of each number... With checkdate() it will check for things such as leapyears, etc...

<?PHP

$dob = "01/01/1984"; # DD/MM/YYYY
list($day, $month, $year) = split("/", $dob);

if ($year >= 1900 && $year <= 2003) {
	if (!checkdate($month, $day, $year)) {
		echo "Invalid date";
	}
}
else {
	echo "Invalid date";
}

?>