Question

When inputting new users' email addresses and names into the Copy User interface, why not accept more formats? Right now it is very rigid: Email,FullName.

What I'm looking for is probably best described procedurally.

For each line:

1. Look for '@' in the input string.
2. Grab all characters around '@' until whitespace is encountered; perform any desired validation, and you have the user's email address.
3. Remove the resulting email address from the string.
4. Grab everything else, trim, and you have the user's full name.

This will allow entry in many different formats. I don't really see a downside.

I find myself pasting in lists of new users quite frequently, and the rigidness of the expected format gets in the way of my Getting Things Done.

Answer 1

That sounds like a cool idea. Thanks for suggesting it!

Please vote up this question to show your support for this feature request!

The reason we currently use such a strict format is because it is predictable and doesn't require you, as the person entering users, to guess at how a given line will be processed. That's not to say that we can't make things smarter, it just means that we have to be careful to make it smarter without also making it more confusing/unpredictable.

For example, what if I'm pasting in email addresses that include display names? (e.g. "Bob Smith" <bob@example.com>)? When do we parse out commas/semicolons/pipes/etc that are being used to separate the full name from the email address? What if the name contains the same separator (e.g. "Smith, Bob")? What if the name contains an @ character (e.g. an account for a twitter user handle)? Yes, these are pathological cases, but that's the problem with providing "flexible" input formats: they are more flexible, but also potentially more error-prone.