An easier way to test a valid username

Question

I have the following requirement for valid usernames:

1. Only alphanumeric characters and -
2. Must not start with a -

I wrote this regex (on Rubular):

/^[^a-zA-Z0-9]|[^a-zA-Z0-9-]+/

Is there a better to test this requirement other than to iterate through all the possible scenarios? I'm doing something like this.

  # There much more, but for brevity's sake I'm only including a few
  illegal_chars = [ "~", "!", "@", "#", "$"]

  illegal_chars.each do |char|
    test "username does not accept #{char}" do
      user = users(:homer)
      user.username = "name#{char}"
      refute user.valid?, "Username should not be valid"
    end
  end

I'll repeat for cases where #{char} is at the beginning and end of the word.

1. Am I testing too much? Is there a better way? Running 70 or 80 tests for something like this seems excessive.
2. As an aside, can my regex be expressed better?

Answer 1

Your regex looks wrong, see my link below.

If your functional requirement is that usernames match a certain regex, then your tests should reflect that. It is wrong to test a bunch of edge cases that a generic regex catches.

See this. All you need in your test is to do:

username_regex = /^[a-z0-9][a-z0-9-]*$/i
passing_usernames = ['passing','pAsSing-PASS-'.....]
failing_usernames = ['-failing','failing#'....]
passing_usernames.each { |username| assert_match username_regex, username}
failing_usernames.each { |username| assert_no_match username_regex, username }

If you're getting your username from somewhere else then just plug that in the same way.