JavaScript regex matching character it shouldn't match

Question

I have the following regex that checks for characters not in the character class:

[^\w+\-:\.\(\)\"\*\?\&\|\!\{\}\[\]\^~\\@\#\/\$\%\'\= ]

I'm expecting that it doesn't match the dash '-' on the following string, however it is:

SEPCO−SEPA50PT−S−TFA−ALC18−PZ4

Most of those backslashes are not needed. You only need to escape meta-characters, — Richard
– Richard, Commented Nov 12, 2015 at 16:43
And most meta-characters lose their special meaning inside []. — Barmar
– Barmar, Commented Nov 12, 2015 at 16:44
Those are special characters I'm escaping. They are checking for literals. For example, \? checks for ?. — Musical Shore
– Musical Shore, Commented Nov 12, 2015 at 16:45

Community · Accepted Answer · 2020-06-20 09:12:55Z

4

The − in this:

SEPCO−SEPA50PT−S−TFA−ALC18−PZ4

is not the same character as the - in your regex. It is in fact the Unicode MINUS-SIGN rather than the Unicode HYPHEN-MINUS.

Here are the two next to each other showing they're different:

−

-

edited Jun 20, 2020 at 9:12

CommunityBot

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answered Nov 12, 2015 at 16:45

James Thorpe

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12 Comments

Musical Shore Over a year ago

How do I check for that?

Felix Kling Over a year ago

@MusicalShore: What do you mean? You add that character to your character class.

James Thorpe Over a year ago

Yes. I also only have - on my keyboard. I don't have é on my keyboard either, but it's still a character.

Felix Kling Over a year ago

@MusicalShore: You probably also don't have ü or ö on your keyboard. But those characters still exist and can appear in text.

James Thorpe Over a year ago

Who knows - that's an entirely different question. What software are they using etc? You need to ask them, not us. The fact is, the character is there. As I mentioned further up, if you type a - in in the middle of a sentence in Word/Outlook etc, it gets turned into yet another dash (– EN DASH). Still looks the same, but yet another different character. Is it perhaps auto generated from somewhere? I find it hard to believe that users would be typing in a code like that?

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