MVC not pulling through validation - asp.net-mvc

Question

I have the following View code:
#using (Html.BeginForm("Login", "Press", FormMethod.Post))
{
<fieldset>
<legend>User Registration</legend>
<div>
#Html.TextBoxFor(model => model.FullName)
#Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.FullName)
</div>
<div>
#Html.TextBoxFor(model => model.Company)
#Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.Company)
</div>
<div>
#Html.TextBoxFor(model => model.EmailAddress)
#Html.ValidationMessageFor(model => model.EmailAddress)
</div>
<div>
#Html.CheckBoxFor(model => model.JoinMailingList)
Please check this box to recieve a seasonal look book pdf and monthly newsletter
</div>
<p>
<input type="submit" value="Proceed" />
</p>
</fieldset>
}
And here is my Model:
public class UserViewModel
{
[Required(ErrorMessage = "Please enter your name.")]
[MaxLength(100)]
public string FullName { get; set; }
[Required(ErrorMessage = "Please enter the name of your company.")]
[MaxLength(50)]
public string Company { get; set; }
[Required(ErrorMessage = "Please enter your email.")]
[DataType(DataType.EmailAddress)]
[RegularExpression(#"^(([A-Za-z0-9]+_+)|([A-Za-z0-9]+\-+)|([A-Za-z0-9]+\.+)|([A-Za-z0-9]+\++))*[A-Za-z0-9]+#((\w+\-+)|(\w+\.))*\w{1,63}\.[a-zA-Z]{2,6}$", ErrorMessage = "Please enter a valid email address.")]
[MaxLength(255)]
public string EmailAddress { get; set; }
public bool JoinMailingList { get; set; }
}
The problem is that when I click on the 'Proceed' button, none of the validation occurs. It just posts the action with no validation performed on it? Do I have to perform this inside the Controller?
Here is my Controller code:
public class PressController : Controller
{
//
// GET: /Press
public ViewResult Index()
{
return View();
}
//
// GET: /Press/Login
public ViewResult Login()
{
return View();
}
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult Login(UserViewModel userViewModel)
{
return RedirectToAction("Index", "Press");
}
}

Answer 1

Make sure that the action you are posting to takes the view model as argument:
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult Press(UserViewModel model)
{
// at this stage the validation has been performed during
// the process of model binding and now you could look in the
// modelstate if the model is vaild:
if (!ModelState.IsValid)
{
// validation failed => redisplay the view so that the user
// can fix his errors.
// Note that calling ModelState.IsValid doesn't trigger any validation
return View(model);
}
// at this stage we know that validation passed => we could do some processing
// and redirect
return RedirectToAction("Success");
}
or some people also use the TryUpdateModel method which also allows you to perform model binding which triggers the validation:
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult Press()
{
var model = new UserViewModel();
// validation will be triggered at this stage and the method
// will return true or false based on the result of this validation
if (!TryUpdateModel(model))
{
// validation failed => redisplay the view so that the user
// can fix his errors.
return View(model);
}
// at this stage we know that validation passed => we could do some processing
// and redirect
return RedirectToAction("Success");
}
And if you want to enable client side validation, just make sure that the following 2 scripts are referenced in your page:
<script src="#Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.min.js")" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script src="#Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.unobtrusive.min.js")" type="text/javascript"></script>

Answer 2

Do you have the client-validation enabled?
See "Step 3: Enabling Client-side Validation" in ScottGu's post
In the server side you must check is the model valid using
ModelState.IsValid