email validator - regex or other method

Hi all,

What is the best way to check if an email address is in the correct format? either using a regex or any other method?

Thanks in advance to any replies.

If you know you're looking at an email address and not something else, then a wildcard match using *@*.* would work, but I'm sure there's a better regex method. And if you don't know if it's an email address, then that would match things like an $address() (nick!ident@host.com), which you wouldn't want.

While regex probably is the best method, there is no best expression...

Should give you an idea:
http://www.regular-expressions.info/email.html
http://regexlib.com/Search.aspx?k=&c=1&m=-1&ps=50

I am unfamiliar with regex, so had alot of trouble following that article. I don't need it to be amazing or even foolproof. I just want a simple check on a string to see if it follows the basic format of an email address.

I took the second expression from the first link, added separators and "case insensitive" flag, and set it into a custom identifier:

Code:

alias ismail {
  var %r = /^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
  if ($regex($1,%r)) { return $true }
  return $false
}

Now try

Code:

//echo -a $ismail(test) $ismail(@nothing) $ismail(123@456) $ismail(nick!ident@host.domain) $ismail(Test@something.com)

And use $ismail(<address>), like in

Code:

alias mailtest {
  if ($ismail($input(Enter eMail address:,eog,Mail Address))) { echo -a valid address given: $! }
  else { echo -a no/invalid address given }
}

Thank You. Very helpful