5 ms·

If you really want to take validation seriously, why not add a human element to it, and not design one line of code to try to fix everything? One of the bigges

If you really want to take validation seriously, why not add a human element to it, and not design one line of code to try to fix everything? One of the biggest problems with email input is typos -- and there are some very common typos that could easily be accounted for with code. For example foo@gmail.co, foo@gmial.com, foo@comcast, etc. It should be common, when these types of typos occur, to prompt the user to fix them. Unfortunately, this is quite rare.

tough 5y ago
Everytime I input my .me domain in one of those well intended websites I get nagged about maybe being wrong and wantint to use .de or whatever. No, I know my email, thx, it's bein prefilled from auto-complete. Don't fucking tell my Im typing it wrong when 1. Its my email, and I'm not even typing
- grimjack00 5y ago
  I have the same issues with my .name domain. Most of the reason I have a gmail address as well is for the sites that don't think "first@last.name" is a real address.
- alasdair_ 5y ago
  Related: I used to use me@<myname>.com but gave up because Gmail uses "Me" as the name when displaying a user's own email address and it was confusing people enormously because a thread would look like: >>>Me wrote: >>Me wrote: >Me wrote: Me wrote:
throwaway787544 5y ago
That would imply that programmers care about users. I've never met a single programmer who cared what the user experience was like. Today they even brag about this, saying "I only want to care about my code!" I see it here on HN all the time, and I hear it in companies.
- jve 5y ago
  The other thing is overengineering. Spending a week to implement email validation? Maybe, if it is REALLY important and results in lost revenue. Otherwise I don't know what common typos are. I would have to do research on that. Then I have popular local email providers where I may come up with typos. but then again, it is only in my region - I would have to get some list of popular email providers in every country. Come up with a way to update that list after few years when new email providers come out. Or maybe develop a solution that matches "close enough" entries in my pre-defined list. UX effort could be spent in an area which is used more often than only once. If there is a library for that, yeah, then slap it in, UX has been upgraded in no time. And again, only if revenue is on the other side of consideration, the development effort pays off.
  - throwaway787544 5y ago
    Revenue focus is not customer focus. You don't get a second chance at a first impression. The difference between a great company and a mediocre one is how much they care. Growth-obsessed companies only care about revenue and the 80% case. Long lasting companies build relationships, listen closely, and feel deeply.
- Tagbert 5y ago
  Perhaps you are only looking for that kind of message. I see concern for users expresses by many devs here and hear it from other devs that I talk to. I can tell you that we have extensive discussions about the user experience whenever planning a new feature or change to and existing one. If our customers are not happy, that affects their use of our product, so of course we make this a priority. Besides, we also use it and we want it to work for anyone using it.
xoptions 5y ago
OP has shared a solution for typo fix in the closing remarks of the blog: https://github.com/mailcheck/mailcheck https://github.com/mailcheck/mailcheck
jancsika 5y ago
> If you really want to take validation seriously, why not add a human element to it, and not design one line of code to try to fix everything? human: a customer telling a clerk, "yes, it's really gmial dot com," and the two sharing a laugh and trading stories about funny email addys human element: the customer curses their phone because the backend folks never tested the edge case of your helpful button for confirming the suspicious case of "gmial.com" and just keep rejecting it. Then, after your helpful chat bot kept autocorrecting their chat input to "gmail.com" they threw their phone on the ground so hard it broke. Don't be a human element.
6510 5y ago
I have a .con in the db

tough 5y ago

Everytime I input my .me domain in one of those well intended websites I get nagged about maybe being wrong and wantint to use .de or whatever. No, I know my email, thx, it's bein prefilled from auto-complete. Don't fucking tell my Im typing it wrong when 1. Its my email, and I'm not even typing

grimjack00 5y ago
I have the same issues with my .name domain. Most of the reason I have a gmail address as well is for the sites that don't think "first@last.name" is a real address.
alasdair_ 5y ago
Related: I used to use me@<myname>.com but gave up because Gmail uses "Me" as the name when displaying a user's own email address and it was confusing people enormously because a thread would look like: >>>Me wrote: >>Me wrote: >Me wrote: Me wrote:

throwaway787544 5y ago

That would imply that programmers care about users. I've never met a single programmer who cared what the user experience was like. Today they even brag about this, saying "I only want to care about my code!" I see it here on HN all the time, and I hear it in companies.

jve 5y ago
The other thing is overengineering. Spending a week to implement email validation? Maybe, if it is REALLY important and results in lost revenue. Otherwise I don't know what common typos are. I would have to do research on that. Then I have popular local email providers where I may come up with typos. but then again, it is only in my region - I would have to get some list of popular email providers in every country. Come up with a way to update that list after few years when new email providers come out. Or maybe develop a solution that matches "close enough" entries in my pre-defined list. UX effort could be spent in an area which is used more often than only once. If there is a library for that, yeah, then slap it in, UX has been upgraded in no time. And again, only if revenue is on the other side of consideration, the development effort pays off.
- throwaway787544 5y ago
  Revenue focus is not customer focus. You don't get a second chance at a first impression. The difference between a great company and a mediocre one is how much they care. Growth-obsessed companies only care about revenue and the 80% case. Long lasting companies build relationships, listen closely, and feel deeply.
Tagbert 5y ago
Perhaps you are only looking for that kind of message. I see concern for users expresses by many devs here and hear it from other devs that I talk to. I can tell you that we have extensive discussions about the user experience whenever planning a new feature or change to and existing one. If our customers are not happy, that affects their use of our product, so of course we make this a priority. Besides, we also use it and we want it to work for anyone using it.

xoptions 5y ago

OP has shared a solution for typo fix in the closing remarks of the blog: https://github.com/mailcheck/mailcheck https://github.com/mailcheck/mailcheck

jancsika 5y ago

> If you really want to take validation seriously, why not add a human element to it, and not design one line of code to try to fix everything? human: a customer telling a clerk, "yes, it's really gmial dot com," and the two sharing a laugh and trading stories about funny email addys human element: the customer curses their phone because the backend folks never tested the edge case of your helpful button for confirming the suspicious case of "gmial.com" and just keep rejecting it. Then, after your helpful chat bot kept autocorrecting their chat input to "gmail.com" they threw their phone on the ground so hard it broke. Don't be a human element.

6510 5y ago

I have a .con in the db