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Form Validation

SilverStripe provides PHP form validation out of the box, but doesn't come with any built-in JavaScript validation (the previously used Validator.js approach has been deprecated).

Required Fields

Validators are implemented as an argument to the [api:Form] constructor, and are subclasses of the abstract [api:Validator] base class. The only implementation which comes with SilverStripe is the [api:RequiredFields] class, which ensures fields are filled out when the form is submitted.

:::php
public function Form() {
	$form = new Form($this, 'Form',
		new FieldList(
			new TextField('MyRequiredField'),
			new TextField('MyOptionalField')
		),
		new FieldList(
			new FormAction('submit', 'Submit form')
		),
		new RequiredFields(array('MyRequiredField'))
	);
	// Optional: Add a CSS class for custom styling
	$form->dataFieldByName('MyRequiredField)->addExtraClass('required');
	return $form;
}

Form Field Validation

Form fields are responsible for validating the data they process, through the `[api:FormField->validate()] method. There are many fields for different purposes (see "form field types" for a full list).

Adding your own validation messages

In many cases, you want to add PHP validation which is more complex than validating the format or existence of a single form field input. For example, you might want to have dependent validation on a postcode which depends on the country you've selected in a different field.

There's two ways to go about this: Either you can attach a custom error message to a specific field, or a generic message for the whole form.

Example: Validate postcodes based on the selected country (on the controller).

:::php
class MyController extends Controller {
	static $allowed_actions = array('Form');
	public function Form() {
		return Form::create($this, 'Form',
			new FieldList(
				new NumericField('Postcode'),
				new CountryDropdownField('Country')
			),
			new FieldList(
				new FormAction('submit', 'Submit form')
			),
			new RequiredFields(array('Country'))
		);
	}
	public function submit($data, $form) {
		// At this point, RequiredFields->validate() will have been called already,
		// so we can assume that the values exist.
		
		// German postcodes need to be five digits
		if($data['Country'] == 'de' && isset($data['Postcode']) && strlen($data['Postcode']) != 5) {
			$form->addErrorMessage('Postcode', 'Need five digits for German postcodes', 'bad');
			return $this->redirectBack();
		}
		
		// Global validation error (not specific to form field)
		if($data['Country'] == 'IR' && isset($data['Postcode']) && $data['Postcode']) {
			$form->sessionMessage("Ireland doesn't have postcodes!", 'bad');
			return $this->redirectBack();
		}
		
		// continue normal processing...
	}
}

JavaScript Validation

While there are no built-in JavaScript validation handlers in SilverStripe, the FormField API is flexible enough to provide the information required in order to plug in custom libraries.

HTML5 attributes

HTML5 specifies some built-in form validations (source), which are evaluated by modern browsers without any need for JavaScript. SilverStripe supports this by allowing to set custom attributes on fields.

:::php
// Markup contains <input type="text" required />
TextField::create('MyText')->setAttribute('required', true);

// Markup contains <input type="url" pattern="https?://.+" />
TextField::create('MyText')
	->setAttribute('type', 'url')
	->setAttribute('pattern', 'https?://.+')

HTML5 metadata

In addition, HTML5 elements can contain custom data attributes with the data- prefix. These are general purpose attributes, but can be used to hook in your own validation.

:::php
// Validate a specific date format (in PHP)
// Markup contains <input type="text" data-dateformat="dd.MM.yyyy" />
DateField::create('MyDate')->setConfig('dateformat', 'dd.MM.yyyy');

// Limit extensions on upload (in PHP)
// Markup contains <input type="file" data-allowed-extensions="jpg,jpeg,gif" />
$exts = array('jpg', 'jpeg', 'gif');
$validator = new Upload_Validator();
$validator->setAllowedExtensions($exts);
$upload = Upload::create()->setValidator($validator);
$fileField = FileField::create('MyFile')->setUpload(new);
$fileField->setAttribute('data-allowed-extensions', implode(',', $exts));

Note that these examples don't have any effect on the client as such, but are just a starting point for custom validation with JavaScript.

Model Validation

An alternative (or additional) approach to validation is to place it directly on the model. SilverStripe provides a [api:DataObject->validate()] method for this purpose. Refer to the "datamodel" topic for more information.

Subclassing Validator

To create your own validator, you need to subclass validator and define two methods:

javascript() Should output a snippet of JavaScript that will get called to perform javascript validation.
php($data) Should return true if the given data is valid, and call $this->validationError() if there were any errors.

Model Validation with [api:DataObject->validate()]

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