InfoPath Dev

 Hi guys,

 I am trying to use data validation to allow a user to enter a name field with these conditions:

1. The name can be any length.

2. It must only be alphabetical characters.

3. It can have zero or more white spaces.

4. It must not contain any any illegal characters other than the alpha + spaces.

I have tried the simple checks but it doesn't seem to work. The pattern matching is somehow different from regular expression at least from my observation or if anyone can suggest a pattern, i have checked google and most of them don't allow spaces or multiple words separated by spaces such as 

 John  Ander Smith

 Is there anyway to do this without going into C#/VB codes?

As this is a very common thing for name fields.

Many thanks,

 

create an additional text box,

on first text box put a rule to set the value of second text box to

translate(translate(., " ", "a"), "α", "b")

on first text box write a data validation

if textbox2 doesnotmatch pattern \p{L}+

this should help you

 Why do you need to create another text box?  (I'm a bit confused).

I want to validate something like this:

First name:    [ user can type anything matching the condition stated above].

I just want to validate a simple text box :).

 I'll try your solution and see what happens.

 I tried your pattern without the second text box, it seems to work ?

I'll have to do further testing but thank you very much.

 The pattern does not take into account spaces.

 However the alpha words are fine but as soon as i put in trailing and leading spaces it generates a validation error.

 

 

hi,

well if you check properly,

i am setting value of second text box to value of first text box - spaces and alphas

i am validating second text box based on the validation of first text box.

give it a shot

also one thing " " this is space not a blank

 I also don't understand why you would suggest using a separate textbox to perform this validation.  That would give the user a confusing textbox with all the spaces converted to as.

This pattern should work:

[a-zA-Z]([ ]*[a-zA-Z])*

The pattern above will approve strings that meet all of the following criteria:

Contains one or more letters

Contains 0 or more spaces

Begins and ends with a letter

Contains no characters that are not letters or spaces

I know you didn't mention the third criterion, but I would imagine that's what you want.  If you don't mind spaces at the beginning and end but still want to require at least one letter, you can use this pattern:

[ ]*[a-zA-Z][a-zA-Z ]*

I am using SaveToSharePoint qRules method to save InfoPath attachments in a SharePoint document library. When we try to attach files with illegal filename characters (\ / : * ? " < > | # { } % ~ &), the SaveToSharePoint method succeeds but cutting off all characters after the first occurence of the illegal character. That leaves the residue in tha document library, with a broken link inside Infopath. To avoid users uploading a file with illegal character, I am trying to validate the filename of an attachment, using the GetAttachmentAttribute qRules method. Is it possible to validate the result of the GetAttachmentAttribute method to check whether it contains any of the illegal characters, using a pattern?

Thanks a lot in advance.

Yes, you should be able to do this. I think this pattern would work:

[^\\ / : * ? " < > | # { } % ~ &]

So, you'd run your rule for GetAttachmentAttribute, then add another rule with a condition that the qRules data source Result node matches this pattern, and you could then clear the node where they attached the file or give them a message or some such....

Thanks Hilary. I tried the following, but got invalid pattern error.

 

 

 

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks!!

That's what I get for testing my regular expression outside of InfoPath.... I'll take a look later today & see if I can come up with something that will work for you.

 Thanks Hilary. For now, I am using the following expression to validate the filename of an attachment. But, if there is a better way, I would like to adapt that.

 

Well, I don't have anything that seems to do any good with custom pattern function in IP. However, I do have something you can do using qRules - what version are you using? This is using the ReplaceString command, that I think I added in v 4.2....

You'd have to store your Result from GetAttachmentAttribute in another field - I'm just using a main data source field, but you could use a 2ds and include the dsnamesrc param:

ReplaceString /xpathsrc=/my:myFields/my:field1 /pattern=[^\\ / : * ? " < > | # { } % ~ &]

If the command returns anything to the Result field, you have one of the special chars listed....

You could also use this condition to check whether a field contains any of the characters you're checking for:

Field != translate(Field, '^\:*?"<>|#{}%~&', "")