Question

I am trying to define the regular expression required for my ASP.NET validator to run properly. Currently with the expression below I am able to properly validate the following sample string in firefox but not in IE

12{2}12{0-9}1{12,13}

using

(({\d+\})*|(\d)*|({(\d+,)+\d+\})*|({(\d+)\-(\d+)\})*)+

After doing some research it seems that this is due to the lookahead bug but since I am fairly new to using regex I do not understand how I can modify it properly to work around the bug?

Please feed me with higher knowledge!!

EDIT:
The expression must match these three optional individual component that can be in the string in any order. I tried to come up with an expression describing each individual component and then merging them into a single expression.

{n} regex {\d+\}  to match sample {423} optional digits

{n,n,n} regex {(\d+,)+\d+\} to match sample set of digit {24,25,26}

{n-n} regex {(\d+)\-(\d+)\} to match sample range of {0-9}

individual digits (\d) to match sample 232

EDIT 2:
In the end I will be using this expression and a special thanks to woohoo

((\d*\#*\**)*\{((\d*\#*\**)+|(\d*\#*\**)+\-(\d*\#*\**)+|((\d*\#*\**)+\,)+(\d*\#*\**)+)\}(\d*\#*\**)*)+

the expression supports digits # and * at every position.

Answer 1

I’m afraid the regular expression you posted above has some errors, and it looks too complicated for what you try to achieve. I would do it this way:

\d+\{(\d+|\d+\-\d+|\d+\,\d+)\}

eventually you can add the + sign to match one or more of these,

(\d+\{(\d+|\d+\-\d+|\d+\,\d+)\})+

or, if you want to match a specific number of those, use {m,n} quantitative expression:

(\d+\{(\d+|\d+\-\d+|\d+\,\d+)\}){3,}

In this case I made it to match exactly 3 pieces.