Rails regex syntax error

Question

I am trying to set a regex validation on a form with the code below. I want to allow any alphabetical character, including accents, numbers and hyphen, apostrophe, comma and space. This expression should match the result : "Tir à l'arc, 3d, danse"

validates :interest_list, tags: true, if: lambda { interest_list.any? }
  validates :interest_list, format: { with: /\A[[:alpha:]\d-'’, ]\z/, message: "only allows letters, space, hyphen and apostrophe" }

But I have this error empty range in char class: /\A[[:alpha:]\d-'’,]\z/

Can anyone tell me what I'm doing wrong ?

The range error seemed to come from the - character who was not escaped/placed at the beginning or the end. — Jean-Baptiste
– Jean-Baptiste, Commented Apr 26, 2016 at 17:14

smathy · Accepted Answer · 2016-04-26 20:29:17Z

6

Any - that appears inside a character class in any position other than the first or last is treated as a range, ie. [0-9] is shorthand for [0123456789]. This range is calculated based on the ASCII values.

You have \d-' in your regex and \d isn't valid to use for the start/end of a range. Probably what you want is to move - to the start or end of your []

/\A[[:alpha:]\d'’, -]\z/

...and to solve your next problem/question - as it is your regex will only match a single character, you probably also want a repeat on that character class, like a +:

/\A[[:alpha:]\d'’, -]+\z/

edited Apr 26, 2016 at 20:29

answered Apr 26, 2016 at 16:04

smathy

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Jean-Baptiste Over a year ago

You got the acceptance because you replied to my second question :) Thanks

user557597 · Accepted Answer · 2016-04-26 16:12:24Z

0

Error: Regex Construction .. 

Invalid range end in character class

\A[[:alpha:]\d->>>HERE>>>'’, ]\z

\d - anything is invalid range because a range operator - cannot
specify a range between a class and anything else.

You'd need to escape the - to make it a literal \A[[:alpha:]\d\-'’, ]\z

or add it to the end or beginning \A[[:alpha:]\d'’, -]\z

answered Apr 26, 2016 at 16:12

user557597

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