Websites that can't correctly validate email addresses

frugal_mike

WTFH wrote: »

The local part of the address can contain pretty much anything (including special characters)...

Well the set of characters it can contain is certainly large, but the allowed syntax is well specified. It's perfectly possible to validate, based on the specification on RFC2282.

WTFH wrote: »

...so how would you like your validation [of email addresses]to be done?

Correctly

Seriously though, if they want to validate the address at all I would expect them to use a Regular Expression to validate the email address against RFC2282. Or (probably more sensible) to download an RFC2282 compliant email validator for the language of choice.

Failing validation for a valid email is bad.

WTFH wrote: »

So, tell me how a programmer is supposed to design an easy to use piece of software which will validate an [postal] address and allow for typing mistakes - whether that be misspellings, misplaced punctuation, wrong digits, etc?

To my mind that it not a solvable problem because to the best of my knowledge (although I may be wrong) there is not a formal specification of a postal address. You can't validate something when there is no definition of what is valid.

You could cross-check with a database of known addresses, but then you would be constantly out of date every time a new property was built.

The best solution (if you don't just want to let the user type it out themselves) would be to auto-complete addresses based on a database of known addresses and then allow the user to make alterations. To be fair to most websites they do seem to do this well.


I know you weren't originally replying to me, but my original rant wasn't that websites don't validate email addresses. It was that they try and get it wrong. someaddress+sometext@googlemail.com is a valid address, but often rejected.

WTFH

frugal_mike wrote: »

I know you weren't originally replying to me, but my original rant wasn't that websites don't validate email addresses. It was that they try and get it wrong. [EMAIL="someaddress+sometext@googlemail.com"]someaddress+sometext@googlemail.com[/EMAIL] is a valid address, but often rejected.

Now, that could be a different matter. Nothing to do with "bad programming", etc, but actually sensible business validation.
It may not be failing because of the local part, but because of the domain.

Many websites will reject email addresses if they are from certain global domains, mainly because those domains are popular with spammers & scammers.

In the days before google, the most popular for spammers was Hotmail. MSN and Yahoo were also popular, but not as bad. If you had 100 "people" sign up to your website using a hotmail account, 90% or more would be spammers.
That's the joy of people wanting something for nothing - spammers want exactly the same thing.

Zedicus

It's not just validation. Sometimes information given is unnecessarily ambiguous.

I'm waiting for a package that is coming tracker RM. It's current status is 'Ready for delivery'. Would it not have been beyond the powers of the microbrains at RM to make that message clear: Either "awaiting assignment to postman" or "out for delivery"?

People seem to spend enormous amounts of money on web sites but never look at them as if they were using them themselves.

MothballsWallet

WiggyDiggyPoo wrote: »

Coming from software testing, I like this cartoon:

That sounds like a post-SAP purchase situation! :rotfl:

WTFH

MothballsWallet wrote: »

That sounds like a post-SAP purchase situation! :rotfl:

Have we a "too close for comfort" smilie?:eek:

frugal_mike

WTFH wrote: »

Now, that could be a different matter. Nothing to do with "bad programming", etc, but actually sensible business validation.
It may not be failing because of the local part, but because of the domain.

That could be possible (although I would have thought cutting yourself off from a large user base would be bad for business), but certainly in my case whenever a website has failed to validate addresses in that form, they did validate it without the '+sometext' part so it was definitely the '+' causing issues.

frugal_mike

MothballsWallet wrote: »

That sounds like a post-SAP purchase situation! :rotfl:

This must have gone over my head, what is SAP and what's the problem with it?

WTFH

frugal_mike wrote: »

This must have gone over my head, what is SAP and what's the problem with it?

It's a big expensive bit of software that runs businesses. It takes a few years to implement and costs several million up front, plus annual fees.

frugal_mike

WTFH wrote: »

It's a big expensive bit of software that runs businesses. It takes a few years to implement and costs several million up front, plus annual fees.

Ah, I see how it might fit the picture now