Why is it important to consider variations in house number formats when filtering them in PHP?

When filtering house numbers in PHP, it is important to consider variations in formats such as alphanumeric characters, special characters, and different separators like dashes or slashes. Failure to account for these variations can lead to inaccurate filtering results or errors in the application. To solve this issue, you can use regular expressions to create a flexible filter that can handle different house number formats. 

// Example code snippet to filter house numbers with variations in formats
$houseNumber = "123A";

// Regular expression pattern to match alphanumeric characters and common separators
$pattern = '/^[\d\w\/\-]+$/';

if (preg_match($pattern, $houseNumber)) {
    echo "Valid house number format";
} else {
    echo "Invalid house number format";
}

Keywords

Regular expressions preg_match address validation data consistency string manipulation

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