Question

So I am seeing some very strange functionality in my app. I have a pretty complex form with nested attributes. Basically on a failed validation I am returned to the form and the failed record has been duplicated. It seems it may be something having the way a model initializes a record after it has failed validation.

NOTE: I am using formtastic to build the form but I have ruled it out as the culprit.

My model is pretty complex, but the parts that matter are:

...
accepts_nested_attributes_for :users
...
after_initialize :build_structure
...
private

def build_structure
   # builds the first user when the firm is initialized
   if users.length < 1
       logger.debug "First User!!!"
       user = users.new
       contact = user.contact = Contact.new
       contact.email_addresses.new
   end
end

A Basic Controller:

def new
  @firm = Firm.new
  render "new", layout: "blankslate" # new.html.erb
end

def create
    @firm = Firm.new(params[:firm])

    respond_to do |format|
        if @firm.save
            format.html { redirect_to root_url(subdomain: @firm.url)}
        else
            format.html { render action: "new", layout: "blankslate" }
        end
    end
end

And the view:

.container
  .row
    .span4.offset4.well
      .page-header
        %h1 Create Your Firm
      = semantic_form_for @firm, url: signup_path do |f|
        = f.input :name
        = f.input :url
        .page-header
          %h1 Create Your User
        = f.fields_for :users do |u|
          = u.fields_for :contact do |c|
            = c.input :first_name
            = c.input :last_name
            = c.fields_for :email_addresses do |cf|
              = cf.input :value, label: "Email Address"
          = u.input :password
          = u.input :password_confirmation


        = f.submit "Signup", class: "btn btn-primary"

Answer 1

The reason that this is happening is that you have User.new in both your model and the “new” action of your controller, I would do the initialization in one place. I do it in the “new” action.