12 ms·

Yes, it is. But as with many things on the internet, it might be spec compliant but nobody can use it because most programmers didn't actually read the spec and

by foepys 8y ago

Yes, it is. But as with many things on the internet, it might be spec compliant but nobody can use it because most programmers didn't actually read the spec and thus implemented what they think is the spec. Most websites will probably validate email addresses with regexes that expect a dot in the host part.

ehnto 8y ago
I still have trouble using .co instead of .com even. No dot would definitely throw a bunch of sites off.
- therein 8y ago
  The situation is even worse with more obscure TLDs like .FYI. I honestly cannot register to a good 80% of the sites I want to.
  - Qwertie 8y ago
    I have a .red domain and haven't hit any issues so far.
- walrus01 8y ago
  There is also a human problem to consider, my spouse owns surname.com (their address is firstname@lastname.com , we run our own authoritative DNS and manage the MX records for lastname.com) , a bunch of people out there assume that they are such a foolish, technically ignorant person that they don't know how to properly format an email address. To the extent that signing up for some things in person just results in time-wasting questions and "what, really", so they just give a gmail address to some people.
  - stevekemp 8y ago
    I remember receiving a phone-call from a tiny online shop - they seemed to think I'd mistyped my email address, because it was "their-company@example.com". They found it unbelievable that my email address could match their domain, and assumed I'd made a mistake.
    - lucb1e 8y ago
      I do this too and it's most fun when giving my email address to physical stores. One time I was in a random optician's shop and had to ask what the store was called, "Such and such" - "alright then, that would be such and such at example.com".
      - ValentineC 8y ago
        I use a catchall as well, but if I think my email address is going to be read by humans somewhere, I try not to throw people off by using something like firstname.companyabbreviation@example.com.
  - ehnto 8y ago
    Absolutely. I am always worried someone will think .co was me being silly and replace it with .com when giving it to people in person. I normally add "no M" to make sure they realise it's intentional.
    - walrus01 8y ago
      Because of this problem I'd be really hesitant to use .co for anything I care about unless I was Colombian or doing business primarily in Colombia.
anonu 8y ago
Unrelated to TLDs but on the subject of email validation: I like to put a +<some sort of tag> after the name on my Gmail address. This is a perfectly legitimate thing to do to tag your emails. Most websites I've come across don't accept such an email address.
- roryisok 8y ago
  I've also yet to find a website that isn't fooled by gmail's dot trick. They all thing myname@gmail.com is a different address to my.name@gmail.com. In fairness this is not an email standard, but you'd think devs would have copped this by now and started to recognise multiple signups from the same user
  - judge2020 8y ago
    Validator[0] node package seems to have a "normalizeEmail" function, site operators just need to start using it. 0: https://www.npmjs.com/package/validator https://www.npmjs.com/package/validator
    - sincerely 8y ago
      Or maybe they should send email to the address their users give them?
      - judge2020 8y ago
        A human creating many alt accounts may not be desirable by a website owner, so requiring multiple real email inboxes or running a mail server adds another barrier to prevent spam.
        Drdrdrq 8y ago
        Not really. I understand why website owners would like that, but it's simply not possible. In the worst case user will use mailcatch.com, aliases or one-time email accounts. No way you can check if the e-mail address is a "real" one. Fortunatelly.
laumars 8y ago
I wish people would stop using regex to validate email. Literally the only way you can check if an email address is a valid one is to send that address a validation email ("Click this link to confirm this is your email address" type thing). Validation emails also come with the added benefit of ensuring people enter their correct address (is not just randomly mashing the keyboard). Of course that doesn't stop them from using multiple addresses nor those burner address services, but neither would regex. The problem is validation emails take more dev time to build so some people get lazy and use form validation such as regex instead.
- mratzloff 8y ago
  Yes. About the only thing you can count on is `.+@.+`
  - Xylakant 8y ago
    A little more elaborate would be [^@]+@[^@]+. It might still be possible to construct an email address that is valid and does not pass via comments in the address, but chances that this happens are low.
    - eadmund 8y ago
      That's a little more elaborate but, as you note, wrong. Just send email to the address.
    - majewsky 8y ago
      This does not match my favorite mail address, "@"@example.org
- BjoernKW 8y ago
  Validating email addresses with regular expressions can make sense from a UX perspective alongside sending a validation email after the address has been validated as "likely a valid email address". If for example during a typical registration process the software merely sends an email instead of also trying to validate the address first the user either has to wait until the email has arrived before entering the remaining data or otherwise might end up with invalid registration data that cannot be retrieved anymore. In this case, the user would have to start over again. This problem could be alleviated by having a two-step process, during which the software merely asks for the email address in the first step and the remaining data can only be filled in after the email address has been verified. However, depending on the requirements of the software it might make sense to not just ask for the email address but additional required information during the first step as well, in which case validating with regular expressions provides a better user experience through feedback.

by foepys 8y ago

ehnto 8y ago

I still have trouble using .co instead of .com even. No dot would definitely throw a bunch of sites off.

therein 8y ago
The situation is even worse with more obscure TLDs like .FYI. I honestly cannot register to a good 80% of the sites I want to.
- Qwertie 8y ago
  I have a .red domain and haven't hit any issues so far.
walrus01 8y ago
There is also a human problem to consider, my spouse owns surname.com (their address is firstname@lastname.com , we run our own authoritative DNS and manage the MX records for lastname.com) , a bunch of people out there assume that they are such a foolish, technically ignorant person that they don't know how to properly format an email address. To the extent that signing up for some things in person just results in time-wasting questions and "what, really", so they just give a gmail address to some people.
- stevekemp 8y ago
  I remember receiving a phone-call from a tiny online shop - they seemed to think I'd mistyped my email address, because it was "their-company@example.com". They found it unbelievable that my email address could match their domain, and assumed I'd made a mistake.
  - lucb1e 8y ago
    I do this too and it's most fun when giving my email address to physical stores. One time I was in a random optician's shop and had to ask what the store was called, "Such and such" - "alright then, that would be such and such at example.com".
    - ValentineC 8y ago
      I use a catchall as well, but if I think my email address is going to be read by humans somewhere, I try not to throw people off by using something like firstname.companyabbreviation@example.com.
- ehnto 8y ago
  Absolutely. I am always worried someone will think .co was me being silly and replace it with .com when giving it to people in person. I normally add "no M" to make sure they realise it's intentional.
  - walrus01 8y ago
    Because of this problem I'd be really hesitant to use .co for anything I care about unless I was Colombian or doing business primarily in Colombia.

anonu 8y ago

Unrelated to TLDs but on the subject of email validation: I like to put a +<some sort of tag> after the name on my Gmail address. This is a perfectly legitimate thing to do to tag your emails. Most websites I've come across don't accept such an email address.

roryisok 8y ago
I've also yet to find a website that isn't fooled by gmail's dot trick. They all thing myname@gmail.com is a different address to my.name@gmail.com. In fairness this is not an email standard, but you'd think devs would have copped this by now and started to recognise multiple signups from the same user
- judge2020 8y ago
  Validator[0] node package seems to have a "normalizeEmail" function, site operators just need to start using it. 0: https://www.npmjs.com/package/validator https://www.npmjs.com/package/validator
  - sincerely 8y ago
    Or maybe they should send email to the address their users give them?
    - judge2020 8y ago
      A human creating many alt accounts may not be desirable by a website owner, so requiring multiple real email inboxes or running a mail server adds another barrier to prevent spam.
      - Drdrdrq 8y ago
        Not really. I understand why website owners would like that, but it's simply not possible. In the worst case user will use mailcatch.com, aliases or one-time email accounts. No way you can check if the e-mail address is a "real" one. Fortunatelly.

laumars 8y ago

I wish people would stop using regex to validate email. Literally the only way you can check if an email address is a valid one is to send that address a validation email ("Click this link to confirm this is your email address" type thing). Validation emails also come with the added benefit of ensuring people enter their correct address (is not just randomly mashing the keyboard). Of course that doesn't stop them from using multiple addresses nor those burner address services, but neither would regex. The problem is validation emails take more dev time to build so some people get lazy and use form validation such as regex instead.

mratzloff 8y ago
Yes. About the only thing you can count on is `.+@.+`
- Xylakant 8y ago
  A little more elaborate would be [^@]+@[^@]+. It might still be possible to construct an email address that is valid and does not pass via comments in the address, but chances that this happens are low.
  - eadmund 8y ago
    That's a little more elaborate but, as you note, wrong. Just send email to the address.
  - majewsky 8y ago
    This does not match my favorite mail address, "@"@example.org
BjoernKW 8y ago
Validating email addresses with regular expressions can make sense from a UX perspective alongside sending a validation email after the address has been validated as "likely a valid email address". If for example during a typical registration process the software merely sends an email instead of also trying to validate the address first the user either has to wait until the email has arrived before entering the remaining data or otherwise might end up with invalid registration data that cannot be retrieved anymore. In this case, the user would have to start over again. This problem could be alleviated by having a two-step process, during which the software merely asks for the email address in the first step and the remaining data can only be filled in after the email address has been verified. However, depending on the requirements of the software it might make sense to not just ask for the email address but additional required information during the first step as well, in which case validating with regular expressions provides a better user experience through feedback.