CakePHP not checking form validation - php

Question

I'm writing a contact form and want to add some simple validation routines. The action for this page looks like this:
public function contact() {
$this->loadModel('Contact');
$this->set('pageTitle', 'Contact me');
}
and the Contact model is this:
<?php
class Contact extends AppModel {
public $useTable = false;
public $validate = array(
'name' => array(
'between' => array(
'rule' => array('between', 1, 60),
'message' => 'Between 1 and 60 characters in length'
)
),
'email' => array(
'kosher' => array(
'rule' => 'email',
'message' => 'Please make sure your email is entered correctly'
),
),
'message' => array(
'between' => array(
'rule' => array('between', 1, 65000),
'message' => 'Between 1 and 65000 characters in length'
)
)
);
}
and finally my view page:
<?php echo $this->Form->create('Contact'); ?>
<?php echo $this->Form->input('name'); ?>
<?php echo $this->Form->input('email'); ?>
<?php echo $this->Form->input('message', array('type' => 'textarea')); ?>
<?php echo $this->Form->end(array('label' => 'Send', 'class' => 'btn btn-primary')); ?>
However, when I submit the form with incorrect values the validation routines aren't called and no error messages are shown.
How can I get Cake to validate the form?

Answer 1

In your contact action all you are doing is loading the Contact model. You have to explicitly call the relevant model method to perform validation. Read the manual properly for how to do that.

Answer 2

Look in the documentation for how to insert/update data from a form in the controller. You'll see something like this:
if ($this->request->is('post')) {
if ($this->Contact->save($this->request->data)) {
// handle the success.
} else {
$this->Session->setFlash(__('The Contact could not be saved. Please, try again.'));
}
}