Extensions
- pg_html5_email_address 1.2.1
README
Contents
pg_extension_name: pg_html5_email_address pg_extension_version: 1.2.1 pg_readme_generated_at: 2023-02-09 15:40:17.834721+00
pg_readme_version: 0.5.6
The pg_html5_email_address
PostgreSQL extension
pg_html5_email_address
is a tiny PostgreSQL extension that offers email address validation that is consistent with the <input type="email">
validation in HTML5.
HTML5 email validation
When it comes to determining what a valid email address is, the HTML5 specification makes more sense than RFC 5322, “which [according to the HTML5 spec writers] defines a syntax for email addresses that is simultaneously too strict (before the "@" character), too vague (after the "@" character), and too lax (allowing comments, whitespace characters, and quoted strings in manners unfamiliar to most users) to be of practical use here.”
Evan Carroll, in response to a Stack Exchange question on what is the best way to store an email address in PostgreSQL, goes a bit deeper:
The spec for an email address is so complex, it's not even self-contained. Complex is truly an understatement, those making the spec don't even understand it. From the docs on regular-expression.info:
Neither of these regexes enforce length limits on the overall email address or the local part or the domain names. RFC 5322 does not specify any length limitations. Those stem from limitations in other protocols like the SMTP protocol for actually sending email. RFC 1035 does state that domains must be 63 characters or less, but does not include that in its syntax specification. The reason is that a true regular language cannot enforce a length limit and disallow consecutive hyphens at the same time.
Apart from RFC 5322 its simultaneous too-looseness and not-loose-enoughness, sticking with HTML5 is a good idea simply to be consistent with the uniquitous HTML5, especially if you're dealing with a PostgreSQL backend—PostgREST-powered I so hope for you—with a HTML5 front.
If you have an irrational fear of reading W3C specs (and I do urge you to get over that fear), MDN, as usual, also has a most excellent write-up about HTML5 email address validation: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/input/email#validation
Finally there is the question of Unicode: are non-ASCII characters allowed in HTML5 email addresses? The HTML5 spec is unclear about this, but domain names definitely can (and now occasionally do) contain non-ASCII characters, and, since RFC 6532, this seems to be also formally allowed in email addresses. But HTML5 goes its own way, as do the browser makers. As of 2023-01-16,
- WebKit does not allow unicode chacters in
<input type="email">
at all. - Neither does Safari.
- Firefox allows unicode characters only in the domain part, not in the local part.
Reference
Object reference
Routines
Function: html5_email_regexp (boolean)
Returns a regular expression that matches email addresses which the HTML5 spec would consider valid.
The optional boolean argument puts capturing groups around both the local (before the ‘@’) and the server part. (Anything more sophisticated than that can only apply to a narrow band of valid email addresses. See the HTML5 email validation section of this readme for details about why this is so.)
Function arguments:
| Arg. # | Arg. mode | Argument name | Argument type | Default expression |
| ------ | ---------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------- |
| $1
| IN
| with_capturing_groups$
| boolean
| false
|
Function return type: text
Function attributes: IMMUTABLE
, LEAKPROOF
, PARALLEL SAFE
Function-local settings:
SET pg_readme.include_this_routine_definition TO true
sql
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION ext.html5_email_regexp("with_capturing_groups$" boolean DEFAULT false)
RETURNS text
LANGUAGE sql
IMMUTABLE PARALLEL SAFE LEAKPROOF
SET "pg_readme.include_this_routine_definition" TO 'true'
RETURN (((('(?x)
^
('::text || CASE WHEN "with_capturing_groups$" THEN ''::text ELSE '?:'::text END) || '
[a-zA-Z0-9.!#$%&''''*+/=?^_`{|}~-]+
)
@
('::text) || CASE WHEN "with_capturing_groups$" THEN ''::text ELSE '?:'::text END) || '
[a-zA-Z0-9](?:[a-zA-Z0-9-]{0,61}[a-zA-Z0-9])?
(?:[.][a-zA-Z0-9](?:[a-zA-Z0-9-]{0,61}[a-zA-Z0-9])?)*
)
$
'::text)
Function: pg_html5_email_address_meta_pgxn()
Returns the JSON meta data that has to go into the META.json
file needed for PGXN—PostgreSQL Extension Network packages.
The Makefile
includes a recipe to allow the developer to: make META.json
to
refresh the meta file with the function's current output, including the
default_version
.
And indeed, pg_html5_email_address
can be found on PGXN:
https://pgxn.org/dist/pg_html5_email_address/
Function return type: jsonb
Function attributes: STABLE
Function: pg_html5_email_address_readme()
Generates the text for a README.md
in Markdown format using the amazing power of the pg_readme
extension.
This function temporarily installs pg_readme
if it is not already installed in the current database.
Function return type: text
Function-local settings:
SET search_path TO ext, pg_temp
SET pg_readme.include_view_definitions_like TO true
SET pg_readme.include_routine_definitions_like TO {test__%}
Procedure: test__pg_html5_email_address()
Tests the objects belonging to the pg_html5_email_address
Postgres extension.
The routine name is compliant with the pg_tst
extension. An intentional choice has been made to not depend on the pg_tst
extension its test runner or developer-friendly assertions to keep the number of inter-extension dependencies to a minimum.
Procedure-local settings:
SET pg_readme.include_this_routine_definition TO true
SET plpgsql.check_asserts TO true
```sql CREATE OR REPLACE PROCEDURE ext.test__pg_html5_email_address() LANGUAGE plpgsql SET "pg_readme.include_this_routine_definition" TO 'true' SET "plpgsql.check_asserts" TO 'true' AS $procedure$ declare invalidemail text; begin assert '#Rowan.de.man+Nelia-de~vrouw=$couple!@localhost' ~ html5_email_regexp(), 'Yes, email addresses can contain all that, and more!';
assert 'Rowan @example.com' !~ html5_email_regexp(),
'But spaces are out of the question.';
assert 'Rowan@' !~ html5_email_regexp(),
'And there has to be _something_ behind the ‘@’';
assert 'Rowan@A' ~ html5_email_regexp(),
'Even if it''s just one character.';
assert 'Rowan@1' ~ html5_email_regexp(),
'Yes, even if it''s just a number.';
assert 'Rówan@example.com' !~ html5_email_regexp(),
'Accents and other non-ASCII characters are not allowed in the local part.';
assert 'Rowan@éxamplé.com' !~ html5_email_regexp(),
'Nor are non-ASCII Unicode characters allowed in the domain part.';
begin
select 'rowan @example.com'::html5_email;
raise assert_failure
using message = '`''rowan @example.com''::html5_email` cast should have raised a `check_violation`.';
exception
when check_violation then
end;
assert 'Rowan@example.com'::html5_email = 'rowan@example.com'::html5_email,
'The case-insensitive collation of the "html5_email" domain should have made ''Rowan@example.com'''
' and ''rowan@example.com'' count as equal.';
assert (regexp_matches('Rowan.de.man@example.com', html5_email_regexp(true)))[1] = 'Rowan.de.man';
assert (regexp_matches('Rowan.de.man@example.com', html5_email_regexp(true)))[2] = 'example.com';
end; $procedure$ ```
Types
The following extra types have been defined besides the implicit composite types of the tables and views in this extension.
Domain: html5_email
The html5_email
domain type enforces that the underlying text
value conforms to the HTML 5 validation rules for email addresses.
See the HTML5 email validation section of this readme for details.
sql
CREATE DOMAIN html5_email AS text
CHECK (((VALUE IS NULL) OR (VALUE ~ html5_email_regexp())))
COLLATE html5_email_ci;
pg_html5_email_address
raison d'etre
The author of pg_html5_email_address
—Rowan—deemed it useful to split off this tiny extension from the PostgreSQL backend of the FlashMQ SaaS MQTT hosting service. Even though the objects in this extension almost seem too insignificant to justify an extension, Rowan couldn't think of any other extension to put this in. And there really is no lower limit to how small PostgreSQL extensions may be.
Authors & contributors
- Rowan Rodrik van der Molen
Colophon
This README.md
for the pg_html5_email_address
extension was automatically generated using the pg_readme
PostgreSQL extension.