CDateValidator set null when empty - php

Question

I'm going crazy trying out different solutions on the net of a fairly simple problem
I have literally hundreds of dates being stored by my application, and my client's source data has a bad habit of dates being in different formats.
For example, one of my models has rules as followed (for completion all are listed for this specific model)
public function rules() {
return array(
array('function, junior, ces,agreement_expected,start_date', 'required'),
array('start_budget', 'numerical'),
array('visa_received,training_days', 'numerical', 'integerOnly' => true),
array('function, junior, ces,currency', 'length', 'max' => 10),
array('agreement_received, status, stop_date_original, stop_date_extended', 'safe'),
array('agreement_received, visa_received, stop_date_original, stop_date_extended', 'default', 'setOnEmpty' => true, 'value' => null),
array('agreement_received,agreement_expected,start_date,stop_date_original,stop_date_extended', 'date', 'format' => 'Y-m-d', 'allowEmpty' => true),
array('id, Sname,PFces, PFdomain,PDkeyword, PFstatus, PRname,PRcountry,PRscore,PRcomment,PRngo,TRname,TRpic, TFfunction, TFx, TRdateofbirth,TRedufields,TRcoach,TRlocation,TRtask,TRcontract,TRproject,TRcontact,TFdateofbirth,TFedufields,TFcoach,TFlocation,TFtask,TFcontract,TFproject,TFcontact,
date1,date2,idate, ddomains,dkeywords,country,agreement, function,ngo, status,group, junior, junior_lastname, junior_firstname,search_all,search_interrupt, ces, agreement_expected, agreement_received, visa_received, start_date, stop_date_original, stop_date_extended,currency, start_budget, training_days', 'safe', 'on' => 'search'),
);
}
what I want to achieve is depicted by following rules
array('agreement_received, visa_received, stop_date_original, stop_date_extended', 'default', 'setOnEmpty' => true, 'value' => null),
array('agreement_received,agreement_expected,start_date,stop_date_original,stop_date_extended', 'date', 'format' => 'Y-m-d', 'allowEmpty' => true),
When I have a form, and I submit an empty value on say stop_date_extended, it is not set to NULL rather an empty string..
What am I doing wrong?
Surely there must be an easy work-around as not using the date validator works peachy.

Answer 1

Yii Default Validator class handles the empty values like this :
/framework/validators/CDefaultValueValidator.php
protected function validateAttribute($object,$attribute)
{
if(!$this->setOnEmpty)
$object->$attribute=$this->value;
else
{
$value=$object->$attribute;
if($value===null || $value==='')
$object->$attribute=$this->value;
}
}
Given the function above your only issue could be that the value[i.e $value] posting by form could be not empty string probably it might have spaces. Probably you could try trim() the values before assigning them to model attributes. Or extend the default value validator e.g
class CMyDefaultValueValidator extends CDefaultValueValidator
{
protected function validateAttribute($object,$attribute)
{
if(!$this->setOnEmpty)
$object->$attribute=$this->value;
else
{
$value=trim($object->$attribute);
if($value===null || $value==='')
$object->$attribute=$this->value;
}
}
}
just note the line : $value=trim($object->$attribute);
Although,I haven't tested above code, I do not know if this is could be done some better way,

Answer 2

if you want to insert null for empty strings, you can do it in your model, after validation:
public function afterValidate()
{
if(empty(trim($this->yourField))) // put whatever logic that you need
$this->yourField = null;
return parent::afterValidation();
}