Many websites that support user accounts require users to enter an email address as part of
the registration process. This email address is then used as
the primary communication
channel with
the user. For instance, if
the user forgets her password a new one can be generated and emailed to
the address on file. But what if, when registering, a user
enters an incorrect email address? Perhaps
the user meant to enter
[email protected], but accidentally transposed
the first two letters, entering
[email protected]. How can such typos be prevented?
The only foolproof way to ensure that
the user's entered email address is valid is to send them a validation email upon registering that includes a link that, when visited,
activates their account. (This technique is discussed in detail in Examining ASP.NET's Membership, Roles, and
Profile - Part 11.)
The downside to using a validation email is that it adds one more step to
the registration process, which will cause some people to bail out on
the
registration process. A simpler approach to lessening email entry errors is to have
the user enter their email address twice, just like how most registration forms prompt
users to enter their password twice. In fact, you may have seen registration pages that do just this. However, when I encounter such a registration page I usually avoid
entering
the email address twice, but instead enter it once and then copy and paste it from
the first textbox into
the second. This behavior circumvents
the purpose of
the two textboxes - any typo entered into
the first textbox will be copied into
the second.
Using a bit of JavaScript it is possible to prevent most users from copying text from one textbox and pasting it into another, thereby requiring
the user to type their
email address into both textboxes. This article shows how to disable cut and paste between textboxes on a web page using
the free jQuery
library.
Read on to learn more!
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