validation on submit button

Question

I have a submit button like this:

<input class="create_button" name="commit" 
       onclick="return validate_activity();" 
       type="submit" value="Save">

I found that this button will always send request to the server whatever the validate_activity() return true or false?

What's the problem here?

UPDATE

Actually, I made a mistake in my validate_activity(), it makes me think it returned false, but it not.

Answer 1

try doing same without return, e.g. onclick="validate_activity();" and check if your function returns false in case of invalidity

Answer 2

Try this...

<form action="...." onsubmit="submitForm()" name="form">

<input type="submit" value="Save">

</form> 


function submitForm(){

    if(validationfails){

        return false;
    }
    else  {
        document.form.submit();
        return true;
    }
 }

Answer 3

<input type="button" name="commit"
value="Save"
onclick="validate_activity(myform)" />

Inside the Javascript, when validated, do form.submit() or else return false.

I hope this helps ! This will validate your form and submit it. This submit will fail if the Javascript is disabled in your browser.

if you want the submit to proceed even if the javascript is disabled in the client browser ( means no validation but will submit), then

<input type="button" name="commit"
value="Save"
onclick="validate_activity(myform);return false;" />

I hope no validation shouldn't hit you at all. But then javascript is just client side and I hope you will have serious sanity checks on the server side anyways and of many, I think people use it for very basic field checks.

Answer 4

You should use the submit event of the form for validation..

<form action="..." method="..." onsubmit="return validate_activity()">
    <...>
    <input class="create_button" name="commit" type="submit" value="Save" />
    <...>
</form>