When using text columns in your tables, you have the option to validate inputs. Using validation that supports regular expressions, you can validate cell values and highlight cells with content that deviates from the valid format.

Activation of the validation of the input of text columns

  1. If you want to validate the entries in an already created text column, first click on the triangle icon of the corresponding column.
  2. Select Customize Column Type from the drop-down menu.
  3. Activate the Validate input slider
  4. Define a target format.
  5. Confirm with Submit.

Definition of the target format

After successful validation, the cells with content different from the target format will be highlighted in red.

Cells highlighted in red with content different from the target format

SeaTable supports regular expressions for validating your entries in text columns.
You can find some examples in the following table:

Regular expression Function
[123456] Check whether an input corresponds to a school grade from 1 to 6.
[1-9][0-9]?[0-9]?[a-z]? Check format of a German house number (3 digits + 1 letter)
[0-9]{5} Checking the format of German postal codes (5x a number between 0 and 9)
[0-9/. \-]+ Checking the format of a phone number
Max.*Mustermann Search for a possible middle name of an author