Question

I have two sets of drop downs for start date and end date. Each date is created by selecting a month, day, and year from 3 separate drop downs. I currently have RequiredFieldValidators on all the drop downs (which just shows a * if nothing has been selected yet), but I need to validate that the end date is greater than the start date. I can take care of the logic behind comparing the dates, but in terms of the validation method used, can someone help me out (I essentially need to validate 6 drop downs all at one time)? I tried a custom validation using client side javascript but couldn’t get it to work. Can you even validate multiple drop downs using ASP.NET validation controls? (which is what I would like to do – I can always write the javascript, but was trying to stay away from this).

Thanks.

Answer 1

Use a custom validator without the control to validate field completed then use this in your aspx page:

<script type="text/javascript">
<!--
    ValidatorHookupControlID("<%= ctrl1.ClientID %>",
     $get("<%= customValidator.ClientID %>"));
    ValidatorHookupControlID("<%= ctrl2.ClientID %>",
     $get("<%= customValidator.ClientID %>"));
    ValidatorHookupControlID("<%= ctrl3.ClientID %>",
     $get("<%= customValidator.ClientID %>"));
//-->
</script>

Edit:
I found a tutorial that better explains what I mean here