Regular expression to validate username

Question

I\'m trying to create a regular expression to validate usernames against these criteria:

1. Only contains alphanumeric characters, underscore an

Answer 1

This one should do the trick:

if (Regex.IsMatch(text, @"
    # Validate username with 5 constraints.
    ^                          # Anchor to start of string.
    # 1- only contains alphanumeric characters , underscore and dot.
    # 2- underscore and dot can't be at the end or start of username,
    # 3- underscore and dot can't come next to each other.
    # 4- each time just one occurrence of underscore or dot is valid.
    (?=[A-Za-z0-9]+(?:[_.][A-Za-z0-9]+)*$)
    # 5- number of characters must be between 8 to 20.
    [A-Za-z0-9_.]{8,20}        # Apply constraint 5.
    $                          # Anchor to end of string.
    ", RegexOptions.IgnorePatternWhitespace))
{
    // Successful match
} else {
    // Match attempt failed
}