Question

I have a working regex for when a user can enter only 1 word into a text box.
However, how can I adjust it, to allow 2,3,4,5 single words? At times, I may need to alter the code to only allow 3 words, for example that is.

Here is my regex ^([a-zA-Z_\-\.]+)$

Answer 1

For matching 2,3,4,5 single words

^(\b[a-zA-Z_\-\.]+?\b\s*){2,5}$

For matching 2 or 4 single words

^(\b[a-zA-Z_\-\.]+?\b\s*){2}$|^(\b[a-zA-Z_\-\.]+?\b\s*){4}$
or
^((\b[a-zA-Z_\-\.]+?\b\s*){2}|(\b[a-zA-Z_\-\.]+?\b\s*){4})$

But it fails under tests abc.def and abc_def =( It founds two words. \b is the wrong idea with your vocabulary [a-zA-Z_\-\.]+…

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Okay, that’s it.

For 2,3,4,5 words

^([a-zA-Z_\-\.]+[^a-zA-Z_\-\.]+){1,4}[a-zA-Z_\-\.]+$

Notice that now non-alphabet symbols in the end are disallowed.