Question

I am trying to create a .NET regular expression (for use in a ASP.NET RegularExpressionValidator control) that matches a name in the format [First Name][Space][Surname] but does not match if a specific name is entered, say Mickey Mouse

This expression works for the first part:

^[a-zA-Z]{2,}\s{1}[a-zA-Z]{3,}$

And this seems to work for the second part:

[^Mickey Mouse]

but I can’t seem to be combine these two together into one expression

Answer 1

What you are currently using is a negated character class. It matches a single character that doesn’t belong to the set of characters M, i, c, k … You get the idea.

If you want to ensure your string isn’t the sequence Mickey Mouse, you need to use a negative lookahead assertion:

^(?!Mickey Mouse$)[a-zA-Z]{2,}\s[a-zA-Z]{3,}$