[RESOLVED] email validation

jmantra

Hi,

I have script that adds e-mail addresses to a text file, but i'd like it validate the e-mail from the html form:

here is the working code I have now:

<?php
$file = fopen("/var/lists/flagstore/flagadd","a+");
fwrite($file, $_POST["name"] . ' '); 
fclose($file);
?>

I tried adding the expression to validate the e-mail along with an if else statement and it would no longer add the input to the text file😕

here is the code:

<?php


if(!eregi("^[_a-z0-9-]+(\.[_a-z0-9-]+)*@[a-z0-9-]+(\.[a-z0-9-
]+)*(\.[a-z]{2,3})$", $_POST["name"]) {

        echo "The e-mail was not valid";

} else { 
$file = fopen("/var/lists/flagstore/flagadd","a+");
fwrite($file, $_POST["name"] . ' '); 
fclose($file);
?>

any thoughts?

etully

You don't have matching parentheses in your if statement. You need a closing ")".

jmantra

added the curly bracket to close the if statement still no go 🙁

etully

You also need the parentheses.

Change this:
if(!eregi("^[_a-z0-9-]+(\.[_a-z0-9-]+)*@[a-z0-9-]+(\.[a-z0-9-
]+)*(\.[a-z]{2,3})$", $_POST["name"])

to this:

if(!eregi("^[_a-z0-9-]+(\.[_a-z0-9-]+)*@[a-z0-9-]+(\.[a-z0-9-
]+)*(\.[a-z]{2,3})$", $_POST["name"]))

jmantra

ok the if statements now works now I got another issue, the expression isn't working properly, it's saying my address is not valid even though I am using "justin@aol.com" as my test e-mail

for reference I used the code from this site:

http://www.zend.com/zend/spotlight/ev12apr.php

etully

Try this one. Also found on Zend's site:

 preg_match('/^[A-z0-9_\-]+\@(A-z0-9_-]+\.)+[A-z]{2,4}$/', $emailfield)

jmantra

hmm the preg_match expression didn't work:

<?php

if (preg_match('/^[A-z0-9_\-]+\@(A-z0-9_-]+\.)+[A-z]{2,4}$/', $_POST["name"])) {

        echo "The e-mail was not valid";

} else { 
$file = fopen("/var/lists/flagstore/flagadd","a+");
fwrite($file, $_POST["name"] . ' '); 
fclose($file);

}
?>

NogDog

You probably want to negat it, just like you did with the eregi version.

if([color=red]![/color]preg_match(...)) {

NogDog

PS: For a more robust email format validation:

# email address validation function
# kudos to http://iamcal.com/publish/articles/php/parsing_email/
function is_valid_email_address($email) {
   $qtext = '[^\\x0d\\x22\\x5c\\xa6-\\xff]';
   $dtext = '[^\\x0d\\x5b-\\x5d\\xa6-\\xff]';
   $atom = '[^\\x00-\\x20\\x22\\x28\\x29\\x2c\\x2e\\x3a-\\x3c'.
   '\\x3e\\x40\\x5b-\\x5d\\xa6-\\xff]+';
   $quoted_pair = '\\x5c[\\x00-\\xa5]';
   $domain_literal = "\\x5b($dtext|$quoted_pair)*\\x5d";
   $quoted_string = "\\x22($qtext|$quoted_pair)*\\x22";
   $domain_ref = $atom;
   $sub_domain = "($domain_ref|$domain_literal)";
   $word = "($atom|$quoted_string)";
   $domain = "$sub_domain(\\x2e$sub_domain)*";
   $local_part = "$word(\\x2e$word)*";
   $addr_spec = "$local_part\\x40$domain";
   return (preg_match("!^$addr_spec$!", $email));
}
// usage:
if(!is_valid_email_address($some_email))
{
   // not a validly formatted email address
}

The_Chancer

Can't remember where I got this from, but has been tweaked slightly. This is for a unix box only but can be modified to run under windows.
This is very heavy on the network, as it will check the host to ensure it is correct by opening a socket to it too to ensure the domain is all OK.

function ValidateMail($Email) {
	$HTTP_HOST = $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'];
	$result = array(); 
	if (!eregi("^[_a-z0-9-]+(\.[_a-z0-9-]+)*@[a-z0-9-]+(\.[a-z0-9-]+)*(\.[a-z]{2,3})$", $Email)) 
	{
		$result[0]=false;
		$result[1]="The email address is not properly formatted";
		return $result;
	} 
	list ( $Username, $Domain ) = split ("@",$Email);
	$mxs = getmxrr($Domain, $MXHost);
	if (count($mxs)>0)
	{

	$ConnectAddress = $mxs[0];
} 
else 
{
	$ConnectAddress = $Domain;
}
@$Connect = fsockopen ( $ConnectAddress, 25 );
if ($Connect) 
{
	if (ereg("^220", $Out = fgets($Connect, 1024))) 
	{
		fputs ($Connect, "HELO $HTTP_HOST\r\n");
		$Out = fgets ( $Connect, 1024 );
		fputs ($Connect, "MAIL FROM: <".$Email.">\r\n");
		$From = fgets ( $Connect, 1024 );
		fputs ($Connect, "RCPT TO: <".$Email.">\r\n");
		$To = fgets ($Connect, 1024);
		fputs ($Connect, "QUIT\r\n");
		fclose($Connect);
		if (!ereg ("^250", $From) || !ereg ( "^250", $To )) {
			$result[0]=false;
			$result[1]="Server rejected address ";
			return $result;
		}
	}
	else 
	{
		$result[0] = false;
		$result[1] = "No response from server";
		return $result;
	}
}  
else 
{
	$result[0]=false;
	$result[1]="Can not connect E-Mail server.";
	return $result;
} 
$result[0]=true;
$result[1]="$Email appears to be valid.";
return $result;
} // end of function }

To have this run on windows box, because the getmxrr function is not there for windows, have this as another function too.

function getmxrr($hostname, &$mxhosts)
{
   $mxhosts = array();
   exec('%SYSTEMROOT%\\system32\\nslookup.exe -q=mx '.$hostname.' enterdnsiphere', $result_arr);
   foreach($result_arr as $line)
   {
     if (preg_match("/.*mail exchanger = (.*)/", $line, $matches))
         $mxhosts[] = $matches[1];
   }
   return $mxhosts;
}//--End of workaround

Sorry - usage

$email = ValidateEmail($emailaddy);
if ($email[0]==0)
{
      echo $email[1];
}
else
{
     //all ok so carry on
}

NogDog

The Chancer wrote:
Can't remember where I got this from, but has been tweaked slightly. This is for a unix box only but can be modified to run under windows.
This is very heavy on the network, as it will check the host to ensure it is correct by opening a socket to it too to ensure the domain is all OK.
...

One problem with this approach is that it can return some false negatives, as not all mail hosts will be accessible via this method, and not all accessible ones will reply to it. The only way to be truly sure that an email address exists (as opposed to simply being in a valid format, which is all the other posts were addressing) is to send an email to it and have the user respond, typically by clicking a link which includes a unique ID which was stored in a database in some sort of "awaiting confirmation" record.

The_Chancer

That is true - I usually put a "Skip Host Validation" option, so the email can be parsed as OK, with any form of validation (authentication link etc) in the sent mail.
Oddly enough, this fails on some - but not all - hotmail.com addresses. Looks like even MS can't get the config the same on everything.. lol