README

A PHP package to verify if an email address belongs to an academic or research institution. This package helps you validate whether an email address is from a recognized academic institution.

Live Demo

Try the package live at: verify-academic-email.asamoahboateng.com

Installation

You can install the package via Composer:

composer require asamoahboateng/academic-email-verifier:^1.0

Requirements

PHP 8.2 or higher
JSON extension

Usage

Basic Usage

use AcademicEmailVerifier\AcademicEmailVerifier;

$verifier = new AcademicEmailVerifier();

// Verify an academic email
$result = $verifier->verify('student@harvard.edu');

// Check the result
if ($result['is_academic']) {
    echo "This is an academic email from: " . $result['university'];
} else {
    echo "Error: " . $result['error'];
}

Domain Exceptions

You can add custom domain exceptions for institutions that aren't in the main database:

use AcademicEmailVerifier\AcademicEmailVerifier;

$verifier = new AcademicEmailVerifier();

// Add multiple domain exceptions
$verifier->addDomainException('custom.edu', 'Custom University');
$verifier->addDomainException('research.org', 'Research Institute');
$verifier->addDomainException('college.ac.uk', 'British College');

// You can add as many as you need
$verifier->addDomainException('university.edu.gh', 'Ghana University');
$verifier->addDomainException('institute.co.za', 'South African Institute');

// Get all domain exceptions
$exceptions = $verifier->getDomainExceptions();
// Result will contain all added exceptions:
// [
//     'custom.edu' => ['name' => 'Custom University', 'domains' => ['custom.edu']],
//     'research.org' => ['name' => 'Research Institute', 'domains' => ['research.org']],
//     'college.ac.uk' => ['name' => 'British College', 'domains' => ['college.ac.uk']],
//     'university.edu.gh' => ['name' => 'Ghana University', 'domains' => ['university.edu.gh']],
//     'institute.co.za' => ['name' => 'South African Institute', 'domains' => ['institute.co.za']]
// ]

// Remove specific exceptions
$verifier->removeDomainException('research.org');

// Clear all exceptions if needed
$verifier->clearDomainExceptions();

Available Methods

verify(string $email): array

Verifies if an email belongs to an academic institution. Returns an array with:

is_academic (boolean): Whether the email is from an academic institution
university (string|null): The name of the university if found
error (string|null): Error message if verification fails

isValidEmail(string $email): bool

Checks if the email format is valid.

addDomainException(string $domain, string $institutionName): void

Adds a custom domain to be considered as academic.

removeDomainException(string $domain): void

Removes a previously added domain exception.

getDomainExceptions(): array

Returns all currently added domain exceptions.

clearDomainExceptions(): void

Removes all domain exceptions.

Example Results

// Academic email
$result = $verifier->verify('student@harvard.edu');
// Result:
// [
//     'is_academic' => true,
//     'university' => 'Harvard University',
//     'error' => null
// ]

// Non-academic email
$result = $verifier->verify('user@gmail.com');
// Result:
// [
//     'is_academic' => false,
//     'university' => null,
//     'error' => 'Domain not found in academic institutions database'
// ]

// Invalid email format
$result = $verifier->verify('invalid-email');
// Result:
// [
//     'is_academic' => false,
//     'university' => null,
//     'error' => 'Invalid email format'
// ]

Testing

Run the test suite using PHPUnit:

composer test

License

This package is open-sourced software licensed under the MIT license.

Author

Kwame Boateng
Email: kwame@asamoahboateng.com

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

Security

If you discover any security related issues, please email kwame@asamoahboateng.com instead of using the issue tracker.

asamoahboateng / academic-email-verifier

Maintainers

Details