Required fields - lists and others

[DerekPapworth]

Hi there,

Trying to get a list field to be required whereby it's blank by default if it's a new record or if the db record is NULL but the user must choose a value from the list. I assume this must be possible by using a combination of the "Allow empty" setting along with the "Empty List Selection string" however no matter which combination I try it allows me to save a record with blank (not selected) entry. What's exactly the right way to do this? Note I don't want the the first entry selected by default, the user must be forced to choose a value so they can't just open a record and save it, they must goto the field to choose a valid selection.

Also there doesn't seem to be anywhere to declare other sorts of fields (integer, text, etc) to be required (not empty) - is that right?

Thanks,

Derek

[Rob Nicol]

I think you'll want to use Field Validation to ensure that a value is entered prior to saving.
A combination of "Empty List Selection String" and "Allow Empty" can be used to set the initial value to blank on new records (or records that have a null value in the db).

Have a look here to see if this would help:
http://dragonrad.com/twiki/bin/view/Help/FieldValidation

Also discussed here:
http://dragonrad.com/smf/index.php?topic=34.0

I'll update our documentation a little for the "Empty List Selection String" and "Allow Empty". It should be covered here:
http://dragonrad.com/twiki/bin/view/Help/OtherFields#List_field

[DerekPapworth]

Hi Rob,

Ok looks like Field Validation would be the answer then which I'll explore.

Guess I was hoping that Required vs Optional would be a standard flag say against a field rather than having to create a script as that's one validation that's used so frequently so might be worth thinking about for future?

Thanks,

Derek

[Rob Nicol]

Thanks for the feedback Derek!

We'll look into a flag to make it easier to define mandatory/optional fields. Perhaps by checking null/empty string as a basic check if the field is tagged mandatory.

Rob