Question

I’ve asked a question to know why, in my application, textboxes are being highlighted (i.e. red border and pink-shaded backgroung are applied to the textbox) when I use modelbinding to validate the model (TryUpdateModel()) but not when I validate manually (ModelState.AddModelError). It has been 2 days now without any answer. I’ve tried every thing myself without succes. So, I decide to ask the question differently.

The way I understand IT, here’s how ModelBinding treats a request.

1. ModelBinding get incoming values from httpcontext
2. It instantiate an object of that model
3. Tries to parse those values to the object
4. If there’s someting wrong with a property, it uses ModelState.AddModelError to mark properties that has something wrong with them.
5. Re-displays the view

Here’s my question When the form is re-displayed:

What’s being done for the textboxes whose values are not valid to get highlighted?

I know that there’s few classes in Site.css, such as .input-validation-error and .field-validation-error that get applied to the textbox. Maybe ModelBinding uses internally a command such as AddCss(“#MyTextBox”, “.input-validation-error”).

If I know how it works, I can (maybe) aplly it manually and solve my problem.

EDIT

As requested by @Ian Galloway, here’s the code

public class RegistrationController : Controller
{
  public FormViewModel formViewModel;
  private RegistrationService _registrationService = new RegistrationService();
  private SaveService _saveService = new SaveService();
  protected override void OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext)
    {
        var serialized = Request.Form["formViewModel"];
        if (serialized != null)
        {
            formViewModel = (FormViewModel)new MvcSerializer()
                            .Deserialize(serialized);
            TryUpdateModel(formViewModel);
        }
        else
            formViewModel = (FormViewModel)TempData["formViewModel"] 
                            ?? new   FormViewModel();
    }
  protected override void OnResultExecuted(ResultExecutedContext filterContext)
    {
        if (filterContext.Result is RedirectToRouteResult)
            TempData["formViewModel"] = formViewModel;
    }
    public ActionResult SetUpOrganization(string cancel, string nextButton)
    {
        if ((nextButton != null) && ModelState.IsValid)
        {
            if (formViewModel.navigationData.IsAReview)
                return RedirectToAction("RequestPreview");
            return RedirectToAction("ChooseTypeOrganization");
        }
        ViewData["Cities"] = _registrationService.Get_Cities();
        formViewModel.navigationData.NextAction = "SetUpOrganization";
        return View(formViewModel);
    }
  public ActionResult ChooseTypeOrganization(string backButton, string nextButton)
    {
        if (backButton != null)
        {
            return RedirectToAction("SetUpOrganization");
        }
        if (nextButton != null)
        {
            if (formViewModel.navigationData.IsAReview)
                return RedirectToAction("RequestPreview");
            return RedirectToAction("DocumentsPresented");
        }
        ViewData["TypeOrganization"] = _registrationService.Get_AllTypeOrganization();
        formViewModel.navigationData.NextAction = "ChooseTypeOrganization";
        return View(formViewModel);
    }
    public ActionResult DocumentsPresented(string backButton, string nextButton)
    {
        if (backButton != null)
        {
            return RedirectToAction("ChooseTypeOrganization");
        }
        if (nextButton != null)
        {
            //Validation
            if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(formViewModel.registrationData.DocumentPresente))
            {
                ModelState.AddModelError("DocumentPresente", "Veuillez préciser votre
                  autorisation");
                return View(formViewModel);
            }
            //Navigation
            if (formViewModel.navigationData.IsAReview)
                return RedirectToAction("RequestPreview");
            return RedirectToAction("PeopleRecommended");
        }
        formViewModel.navigationData.NextAction = "DocumentsPresented";
        return View(formViewModel);
    }
  public ActionResult PeopleRecommended(string backButton, string nextButton, string deleteButton,
                                          string deletePerson, string addPerson)
    {
        if (backButton != null)
        {
            return RedirectToAction("DocumentsPresented");
        }
        if (nextButton != null)
        {
            ModelState.Clear();
            if (formViewModel.registrationData.PeopleRecommended.Count == 0)
                ModelState.AddModelError("", "Il faut absolument designer un responsable pour la requête");
            //
            if (ModelState.IsValid)
            {
                if (formViewModel.navigationData.IsAReview)
                    return RedirectToAction("RequestPreview");
                return RedirectToAction("StateObjectifs");
            }
            else
            {
                return View(formViewModel);
            }
        }
        //
        if (addPerson != null)
        {
            if (ModelState.IsValid)
            {
                formViewModel.registrationData.PeopleRecommended.Add(
                    _registrationService.Translate_PersonToBeAdded_Into_Person(formViewModel.personToBeAdded)
                    );
                formViewModel.personToBeAdded = null;
            }
            else
            {
                formViewModel.navigationData.NextAction = "PeopleRecommended";
                return View(formViewModel);
            }
        }
        if (deleteButton != null)
        {
            formViewModel.registrationData.PeopleRecommended.RemoveAt(int.Parse(deletePerson));
        }
        ViewData.ModelState.Clear();
        formViewModel.navigationData.NextAction = "PeopleRecommended";
        return View(formViewModel);
    }
    [ValidateInput(false)]
    public ActionResult StateObjectifs(string backButton, string nextButton)
    {
        if (backButton != null)
        {
            return RedirectToAction("PeopleRecommended");
        }
        if (nextButton != null)
        {
            if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(formViewModel.registrationData.Objective) ||
               string.IsNullOrEmpty(formViewModel.registrationData.RequestDetails))
            {
                 if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(formViewModel.registrationData.Objective))
                     ModelState.AddModelError("Objective", "Vous devez préciser l'objectif de votre requête");

                 if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(formViewModel.registrationData.RequestDetails))
                     ModelState.AddModelError("RequestDetails", "Vous devez préciser le contenu de votre requête");
                 return View(formViewModel);
            }

            if (formViewModel.navigationData.IsAReview)
                return RedirectToAction("RequestPreview");
            return RedirectToAction("StateDeadLine");
        }
        return View(formViewModel);
    }

    public ActionResult StateDeadLine(string backButton, string nextButton)
    {
        if (backButton != null)
        {
            return RedirectToAction("StateObjectifs");
        }
        if (nextButton != null)
        {
            if (formViewModel.registrationData.ChooseDifferentDeadLine)
            {
                if (formViewModel.registrationData.DifferentDeadline == null ||
                    string.IsNullOrEmpty(formViewModel.registrationData.ReasonsForDifferentDeadLine))
                {
                    if (formViewModel.registrationData.DifferentDeadline == null)
                        ModelState.AddModelError("DifferentDeadline", "Clickez pour choisir une nouvelle date");
                    if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(formViewModel.registrationData.ReasonsForDifferentDeadLine))
                        ModelState.AddModelError("ReasonsForDifferentDeadLine", "Expliquez brievement pour quoi ce changement");

                    return View(formViewModel);
                }
            }
            return RedirectToAction("RequestPreview");
        }
        formViewModel.navigationData.NextAction = "StateDeadLine";
        return View(formViewModel);
    }
  public ActionResult RequestPreview(string backButton, string nextButton, string reviewInput, string save)
    {
        if (backButton != null)
        {
            return RedirectToAction("StateDeadLine");
        }
        if (nextButton != null)
        {
            _saveService.Save_FormViewModel(formViewModel);   
            return RedirectToAction("Index", "Home");
        }
        if (reviewInput != null)
        {
            formViewModel.navigationData.IsAReview = true;
            return RedirectToAction(RedirectHelpers.RedirectReviewAction(formViewModel.navigationData, reviewInput));
        }
        ViewData["TypeOrganization_Summary"] = _registrationService.Get_TypeOrganization_Summary(
                                                                formViewModel.registrationData.TypeOrganizationID                                                                   );
        if (save != null)
        {
            _saveService.Save_FormViewModel(formViewModel);
            return RedirectToAction("Index", "Home");
        }

        formViewModel.navigationData.NextAction = "RequestPreview";
        return View(formViewModel);
    }
}

EDIT number 2

I have choosed one of the view (as all of them experience the same issue). The view is called StateObjectifs.aspx

<asp:Content ID="Content2" ContentPlaceHolderID="MainContent" runat="server">
<!-- Script Begin -->
<script src="../../Scripts/tiny_mce/tiny_mce.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script type = "text/javascript">
    tinyMCE.init({
        mode: "textareas",
        theme: "advanced",

        theme_advanced_toolbar_location: "top",
        theme_advanced_toolbar_align: "left",
        theme_advanced_statusbar_location: "bottom",
        theme_advanced_resizing: true
    });
</script>
 <!-- End Script -->
<fieldset id = "StateObjectifs">
    <legend>Etape 5:</legend>
    <div id = "left-pane" style = "width:700px">
    <%using (Html.BeginForm("StateObjectifs", "Registration"))
  { %>
   <%: Html.ValidationSummary() %>
  <% = Html.Serialize("formViewModel", Model) %> 
  <table>
    <tr>
        <th><% = Html.LabelFor(x=>x.registrationData.Objective) %></th>
        <td><% = Html.TextBoxFor(x=>x.registrationData.Objective) %>
            <%: Html.ValidationMessageFor(x =>x.registrationData.Objective, "*")%></td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <th colspan = "2"><% = Html.LabelFor(x =>x.registrationData.RequestDetails) %></th>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td colspan = "2">
            <% = Html.TextAreaFor(x =>x.registrationData.RequestDetails, 10, 75, null) %>

        </td>
    </tr>
  </table>
  </div>
  <div id = "right-pane">
        <ul>
            <li>Les cases pour lesquelles le titre se termine par (*) sont obligatoires</li>
            <li>Pour mieux vous servir, veuillez décrire clairement de manière concise
                votre requête. Par exemple: <i>Les données de l'USAID sur le secteur santé pour l'année 2009</i></li>
        </ul>  
      </div>
      <div class = "clear"></div>

  <fieldset>
            <% Html.RenderPartial("NavigationView", Model.navigationData); %>
  </fieldset>
</fieldset>
<%} %>

Thanks for helping.

Answer 1

Actually this highlighting is performed by the html helpers that render the textboxes. It checks if there’s an error in the model state with the given key and it adds the necessary CSS classes if necessary.