Why won't preg_match work?

Question

Ever since "ereg" became depreciated, I began to use "preg_match". Unfortunately in my code, it doesn't accept my valid e-mail address. I am certain that this Regular Expression i'm using is working, but what I'm looking for is an alternative in doing this function or to point out what I'm doing wrong.

Here's my function:

function validate($email){
  $regex = "^((([a-z]|[0-9]|!|#|$|%|&|'|\*|\+|\-|/|=|\?|\^|_|`|\{|\||\}|~)+(\.([a-z]|[0-9]|!|#|$|%|&|'|\*|\+|\-|/|=|\?|\^|_|`|\{|\||\}|~)+)*)@((((([a-z]|[0-9])([a-z]|[0-9]|\-){0,61}([a-z]|[0-9])\.))*([a-z]|[0-9])([a-z]|[0-9]|\-){0,61}([a-z]|[0-9])\.(af|ax|al|dz|as|ad|ao|ai|aq|ag|ar|am|aw|au|at|az|bs|bh|bd|bb|by|be|bz|bj|bm|bt|bo|ba|bw|bv|br|io|bn|bg|bf|bi|kh|cm|ca|cv|ky|cf|td|cl|cn|cx|cc|co|km|cg|cd|ck|cr|ci|hr|cu|cy|cz|dk|dj|dm|do|ec|eg|sv|gq|er|ee|et|fk|fo|fj|fi|fr|gf|pf|tf|ga|gm|ge|de|gh|gi|gr|gl|gd|gp|gu|gt| gg|gn|gw|gy|ht|hm|va|hn|hk|hu|is|in|id|ir|iq|ie|im|il|it|jm|jp|je|jo|kz|ke|ki|kp|kr|kw|kg|la|lv|lb|ls|lr|ly|li|lt|lu|mo|mk|mg|mw|my|mv|ml|mt|mh|mq|mr|mu|yt|mx|fm|md|mc|mn|ms|ma|mz|mm|na|nr|np|nl|an|nc|nz|ni|ne|ng|nu|nf|mp|no|om|pk|pw|ps|pa|pg|py|pe|ph|pn|pl|pt|pr|qa|re|ro|ru|rw|sh|kn|lc|pm|vc|ws|sm|st|sa|sn|cs|sc|sl|sg|sk|si|sb|so|za|gs|es|lk|sd|sr|sj|sz|se|ch|sy|tw|tj|tz|th|tl|tg|tk|to|tt|tn|tr|tm|tc|tv|ug|ua|ae|gb|us|um|uy|uz|vu|ve|vn|vg|vi|wf|eh|ye|zm|zw|com|edu|gov|int|mil|net|org|biz|info|name|pro|aero|coop|museum|arpa))|(((([0-9]){1,3}\.){3}([0-9]){1,3}))|(\[((([0-9]){1,3}\.){3}([0-9]){1,3})\])))$";
  if (preg_match($regex, $email)) { 
      return true;
  } else {
      return false;
  }
}

and here's my code to react with the function.

if (validate($email) == false){
  $_SESSION['error'] = "You have an invalid email!<br /><br />";
  header("Location: contact.php");
  die;
}

As I run this code, it shows this error message:

Warning: preg_match() [function.preg-match]: No ending delimiter '^' found in C:\xampp\htdocs\2012\Next\inc\functions.php on line 11

Answer 1

Your regex pattern need delimiters:

function validate($email){
  $regex = "/...your pattern.../";
  if (preg_match($regex, $email)) { 
      return true;
  } else {
      return false;
  }
}

EDIT: AND then you need to escape the delimiters characters in your regex, if present.

Using / as delimiter, you got two in your pattern:

$regex = "/^((([a-z]|[0-9]|!|#|$|%|&|'|\*|\+|\-|\/|=|\?|\^|_|`|\{|\||\}|~)+(\.([a-z]|[0-9]|!|#|$|%|&|'|\*|\+|\-|\/|=|\?|\^|_|`|\{|\||\}|~)+)*)@((((([a-z]|[0-9])([a-z]|[0-9]|\-){0,61}([a-z]|[0-9])\.))*([a-z]|[0-9])([a-z]|[0-9]|\-){0,61}([a-z]|[0-9])\.(af|ax|al|dz|as|ad|ao|ai|aq|ag|ar|am|aw|au|at|az|bs|bh|bd|bb|by|be|bz|bj|bm|bt|bo|ba|bw|bv|br|io|bn|bg|bf|bi|kh|cm|ca|cv|ky|cf|td|cl|cn|cx|cc|co|km|cg|cd|ck|cr|ci|hr|cu|cy|cz|dk|dj|dm|do|ec|eg|sv|gq|er|ee|et|fk|fo|fj|fi|fr|gf|pf|tf|ga|gm|ge|de|gh|gi|gr|gl|gd|gp|gu|gt| gg|gn|gw|gy|ht|hm|va|hn|hk|hu|is|in|id|ir|iq|ie|im|il|it|jm|jp|je|jo|kz|ke|ki|kp|kr|kw|kg|la|lv|lb|ls|lr|ly|li|lt|lu|mo|mk|mg|mw|my|mv|ml|mt|mh|mq|mr|mu|yt|mx|fm|md|mc|mn|ms|ma|mz|mm|na|nr|np|nl|an|nc|nz|ni|ne|ng|nu|nf|mp|no|om|pk|pw|ps|pa|pg|py|pe|ph|pn|pl|pt|pr|qa|re|ro|ru|rw|sh|kn|lc|pm|vc|ws|sm|st|sa|sn|cs|sc|sl|sg|sk|si|sb|so|za|gs|es|lk|sd|sr|sj|sz|se|ch|sy|tw|tj|tz|th|tl|tg|tk|to|tt|tn|tr|tm|tc|tv|ug|ua|ae|gb|us|um|uy|uz|vu|ve|vn|vg|vi|wf|eh|ye|zm|zw|com|edu|gov|int|mil|net|org|biz|info|name|pro|aero|coop|museum|arpa))|(((([0-9]){1,3}\.){3}([0-9]){1,3}))|(\[((([0-9]){1,3}\.){3}([0-9]){1,3})\])))$/";

EDIT 2:

about the error you were getting

Warning: preg_match() [function.preg-match]: No ending delimiter '^' found ...

it found the ^ character as first character in your pattern, taking it as a delimiter, and complained because it did not find a matching ^ delimiter ending the pattern.