Question

How do you express a regular expression where the string matches the following.

text, text, number

NOTE:

text = can be any amount of words or spaces.

number = most be 4 digit number.

the commas (,) must be matched too.

As an example, the following string is valid:

'Arnold Zend, Red House, 2551'

Answer 1

The regex pattern for that would be (the parenthesis are capture groups in-case you want to access the individual items:

([a-zA-Z\s]{3,}), ([a-zA-Z\s]*{3,}), ([0-9]{4})

It matches 2 names and a 4 digit number separated by a comma with the names being at-least 3 characters long. You can change the name character minimum if you’d like. And this is how to check if a string matches this pattern:

// 'Regex' is in the System.Text.RegularExpressions namespace.

Regex MyPattern = new Regex(@"([a-zA-Z\s]*), ([a-zA-Z\s]*), ([0-9]{4})");

if (MyPattern.IsMatch("Arnold Zend, Red House, 2551")) {
    Console.WriteLine("String matched.");
}

I have tested the expression with RegexTester and it works fine.