Codeigniter form validation is not showing errors - php

Question

I'm new to Codegniter so go easy on me. I'm building a simple login form and I have successfully redirected to a page when the login credentials are correct. However, if I submit an empty form I get no error messages. I'm also using set_value in the form field and codeigniter does not refill what the user inputted once the form is submitted. Somehow that data is being cleared. Here are a few things i've done for clarity sake.
Auto-loaded the form_validation library
Auto-loaded form helper
Echoed validation_errors above form
account.php (controller)
<?php if ( ! defined('BASEPATH')) exit('No direct script access allowed');
class Account extends CI_Controller {
public function __construct()
{
parent::__construct();
$this->load->model('User_model', 'user');
}
public function index() {
$this->load->view('home');
}
public function validate() {
$this->form_validation->set_rules('username', 'username', 'xss_clean|required');
$this->form_validation->set_rules('password', 'password', 'xss_clean|required|md5');
$user_data = array(
'username' => $this->input->post('username'),
'password' => MD5($this->input->post('password'))
);
if ($this->form_validation->run() == FALSE)
{
$data['title'] = "Login Fool";
$this->load->view('templates/header', $data);
$data['contents'] = $this->load->view('login_view', $data, TRUE);
$this->load->view('page', $data);
$this->load->view('templates/footer');
}
else
{
$validated = $this->user->validate($user_data['username'], $user_data['password']);
if($validated){
redirect(base_url() . 'account');
}
else{
$this->session->set_flashdata('LoginError', 'Sorry, your credentials are incorrect.');
redirect(base_url() . 'account/login');
}
}
}
public function login() {
$data['title'] = "Login Fool";
$this->load->view('templates/header', $data);
$data['contents'] = $this->load->view('login_view', NULL, TRUE);
$this->load->view('page', $data);
$this->load->view('templates/footer');
}
}
login_view.php (view)
<h1>Login Now</h1>
<?php
if(validation_errors() != false) {
echo "<div id='errors'>" . validation_errors() . "</div>" ;
}
?>
<?= ($this->session->flashdata('LoginError')) ? '<p class="LoginError">' . $this->session->flashdata('LoginError') . '</p>' : NULL ?>
<?php echo form_open('account/validate'); ?>
<label for="username">Username:</label>
<input type="text" size="20" id="username" name="username" value="<?php echo set_value('username'); ?>"/>
<br/>
<label for="password">Password:</label>
<input type="password" size="20" id="passowrd" name="password" value="<?php echo set_value('password'); ?>"/>
<br/>
<input type="submit" value="Login"/>
</form>
Any ideas why the errors won't show above the form?

Answer 1

Turns out my model was the culprit. It was extending CI_Controller not CI_Model. Thanks to everyone who took a look at this. This code works.