Form 'onsubmit' not getting called

Question

Here's the part of my form:

<form name='form-main' onsubmit='return validate()' action='' method='post'>
    <center><input type='submit' onClick='this.disabled=true; this.form.submit();' value='I accept - Download the GM!'/></center>
</form>

and here's the validate function:

function validate()
{
    // this is just to test if it actually shows
    alert('You must not leave any of the fields blank!');
    return false;
}

Whenever I hit the submit button, nothing happens, the page just reloads.. I would like it so it shows the alert dialog.

Answer 1

When you call the form's submit function, the submit event is not fired. This is by design, the assumption is that if you're triggering the submission from code, you've already done any necessary validation. (Note that this is true of the HTMLFormElement#submit function; it is not necessarily true of the wrappers libraries put around it.)

In your example, I would remove the click handler on the button. It's a submit button, so just put any relevant logic in the submit event on the form. Alternately, if you prefer, call validate() as part of the button's click.