Question

I have an action like this:

def add_credit_card
    if request.post?
      unless params[:conditions]
        flash[:error] = 'You need to accept!'
      end
    end
end

This action renders the following view:

<%= form_tag do %>
  <fieldset>
      <%= check_box_tag "conditions"%> I agree to the <%= link_to "Terms and Conditions", consumer_terms_and_conditions_url, :target => "_blank" %>
  </fieldset>
  <%= submit_tag "Submit" %>
<% end %>

When I do a GET to that action no errors are shown. When I do a submit with that box checked no errors are shown. When I do the first submit without that box checked the error is shown, but the problem comes when I do another submit and the checkbox is not checked, the errors are still there.

My questions are:

1. Why is that happening?
2. What would be a better approach to deal with this situation, where a form is not attached to a model and the errors have to be shown just when the user has submitted the form?

Answer 1

Since you’re using the same action, you’ll want to use flash.now so the flash hash does not persist to the next action.

 flash.now[:error] = 'You need to accept!'

Also, it’s not essential, but consider using:

 <%= check_box_tag 'conditions', 'accepted' %>

and then checking the value of the params[:conditions] for the string “accepted” i.e.:

 unless params[:conditions]=='accepted'
   flash.now[:error] = 'You need to accept!'
 end