Regex String Doesn't Start or End With Special Character

Question

SO buddies, greetings. I have some password requirements I need to implement and one of the requirements is the string cannot start or end with a special character. I did spend some time Googling around but my RegEx kung-fu is kimosabe level. Just in case you're interested in some code, here's the JavaScript: Note: Yes, passwords are also validated on the server as well :) The following snippet runs the RegEx tests and simply checks or x's the row item associated with the password rule. ``` var validate = function(password){ valid = true; var validation = [ RegExp(/[a-z]/).test(password), RegExp(/[A-Z]/).test(password), RegExp(/\d/).test(password), RegExp(/[-!#$%^&*()_+|~=`{}:";'<>?,./]/).test(password), !RegExp(/\s/).test(password), !RegExp("12345678").test(password), !RegExp($('#txtUsername').val()).test(password), !RegExp("cisco").test(password), !RegExp(/([a-z]|[0-9])\1\1\1/).test(password), (password.length > 7) ] $.each(validation, function(i){ if(this == true) $('.form tabl…

Accepted Answer

EDIT: The regular expression you want is:-

```
/^[a-zA-Z0-9](.*[a-zA-Z0-9])?$/
```

Additional information

In regular expressions `^` means 'beginning of string' and `$` means 'end of string', so for example:-

```
/^something$/
```

Matches

```
'something'
```

But not

```
'This is a string containing something and some other stuff'
```

You can negate characters using `[^-char to negate-]`, so

```
/^[^#&].*/
```

Matches any string that doesn't begin with a # or a &

Regex String Doesn't Start or End With Special Character

Solution

Problem