What's wrong with my JavaScript regex / regex syntax?

Question

I need a regex to use with javascript/jquery that fits these rules...

• it will include 10 digits
• if there is a leading 1 or +1 it should be ignored
• valid characters allowed in the field are... 0-9,(), and -

I found a regex at Snipplr (the first one), but its not working. First of all, I'm not even sure if that regex fits my rules. Secondly, its allowing inputs like &^%$$#%^adfafsd. I believe the error is in my code not the regex. For example, are there supposed to be quotes around the expression?

Here is the code that is supposed to be validating the phone field...

$('#phone').bind('blur', function() {
    var pattern = new RegExp("^(?:\+?1\s*(?:[.-]\s*)?)?(?:\(\s*([2-9]1[02-9]|[2-9][02-8]1|[2-9][02-8][02-9])\s*\)|([2-9]1[02-9]|[2-9][02-8]1|[2-9][02-8][02-9]))\s*(?:[.-]\s*)?([2-9]1[02-9]|[2-9][02-9]1|[2-9][02-9]{2})\s*(?:[.-]\s*)?([0-9]{4})$");
    if(pattern.test($('#phone').val())){
        $("#phone").addClass("error");
        return false;
    }else{
        $("#phone").removeClass("error");
        return true;
    }
    return true;
})

Answer 1

When you're not using the literal form ( /[regex]/ ), you need to escape the regex string. Try this instead:

var regex = /^(?:\+?1\s*(?:[.-]\s*)?)?(?:\(\s*([2-9]1[02-9]|[2-9][02-8]1|[2-9][02-8][02-9])\s*\)|([2-9]1[02-9]|[2-9][02-8]1|[2-9][02-8][02-9]))\s*(?:[.-]\s*)?([2-9]1[02-9]|[2-9][02-9]1|[2-9][02-9]{2})\s*(?:[.-]\s*)?([0-9]{4})$/;

if(regex.test($('#phone').val()){ ... }