[SOLVED] Really simple but difficult

[dreamkiller23]

I'm working with some simple code that I can't seem to get right.

 

In a nutshell, I'm trying to validate a password field in a form I am creating. I'd like the password field to be:

 

at least 6 characters with the first character being a letter.

at least one upper-cased letter

a number, and a symbol (% or # or ~)

Notice, not all the symbols. Just those 3.

 

This is what I've come up with so far.

 

<?php
$var = "Rad#23";
//[:punct:] is just for testing purposes.
$pattern = "^[a-zA-Z]+([a-zA-Z0-9]|[:punct:]){5}$";

$found = ereg($pattern, $var);

if ($found==true){
echo "it's a match";
}else{
echo "no match";
}


?>

 

The output always seems to be false i.e. no match.

 

I'm workinf into moving this to a bigger page I've created. It looks something like:

 

//I put [:punct:] for just testing purposes.
if (!ereg("^[a-zA-Z]([a-zA-Z0-9]|[:punct:]){5}$",$e)) {
echo "password must be at least 6 characters with the first character<br />
being a letter. The password should have at least one upper-cased<br />
letter, a number, and a symbol (% or # or ~)<br />";
exit();
}else{
$f = mysql_query("SELECT studentID from students where studentID=$a");
$i = mysql_num_rows($f);
if($i > 0){
    echo "Invalid student ID, it already exists. Try again.<br/>";
echo "<a href='http://localhost/trial/login.html'>Back to login</a>";
    unset($a);
exit();
}

$k="INSERT into students (studentID, lastName, firstName, phoneNumber, pwd) VALUES ($a, '$b', '$c', '$d', '$e')";
mysql_query($k) or die(mysql_error());

echo "Student added!<br/>";

 

Any help? Please and thank you.

[effigy]

http://www.phpfreaks.com/forums/index.php/topic,194270.0.html

[dreamkiller23]

Thank you good sir. This is solved.