Masking input with optional alphabet prefix to a p

Question

I know of this nice jquery plugin: http://digitalbush.com/projects/masked-input-plugin/ for Masked input, and I can use it fine.

So let's say I want a field to be masked by this format: [phone] That's fine, and it's working.

The issue is that sometimes within the field, my users also have the option of giving some text before the number.

So the two inputs that are valid for a user are:

• [phone]
• any optional alphabet letters and special characters (but not digits!) [phone],

So for example, this is a valid user input: [phone].

And this is also a valid user input: Phone #: [phone].

How can I make this mask?

Edit

For the second type of input, there are actually a finite number of alphabetical prefixes possible, like these:

• Phone: [phone]
• Phone [phone]
• Phone # [phone]
• Phone #: [phone]
• Call: [phone]
• Call me: [phone]
• Call [phone]
• Telephone [phone]
• Telephone # [phone]
• Telephone: [phone]
• Talk [phone]
• Contact: [phone]
• Contact # [phone]
• Contact #: [phone]

Basically, just the usual possible ways of telling users to "call" at a given number. For this problem, let's assume the prefix can only be the above words. So that means the format for the prefix is usually Call|Contact|Talk|Phone|Telephone, optional #, optional :.

And the overall mask is something like: optional Call|Contact|Talk|Phone|Telephone optional # optional : [phone]

Answer 1

Use the following regular expression:

var phone_mask = /^[^0-9]*\+9{3}\s9\s9{3}\s9{4}$/;

phone_mask.test("Phone: [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Phone [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Phone # [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Phone #: [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Call: [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Call me: [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Call [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Telephone [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Telephone # [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Telephone: [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Talk [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Contact: [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Contact # [phone]")
phone_mask.test("Contact #: [phone]")

Here is a commented breakdown of the regular expression:

var phone_mask = RegExp("^[^0-9]*"/* Optional non-numeric characters */ +
                        "\\+9{3}" /* Followed by a plus sign and three nines */ +
                        "\\s9"    /* Followed by a space and one nine */  +
                        "\\s9{3}" /* Followed by a space and three nines */ +
                        "\\s9{4}" /* Followed by a space and four nines */ +
                        "$");