form_tag not producing output

rubyonrails-talk
1

I've got two servers, both with Rails 1.1.6 on them. I'm trying to remove some of the newly-deprecated stuff in my app, and I've run into a problem. My login page used to look like this:

<div title="Account login" id="loginform" class="form"> <h1>Please Sign In</h1>

<%= start_form_tag :action => 'login' %>

    <label for="user_login">Login:</label><br/>     <input type="text" name="user_login" id="user_login" size="30" value=""/><br/>

    <label for="user_password">Password:</label><br/>     <input type="password" name="user_password" id="user_password" size="30"/>

    <br/>     <input type="submit" name="login" value="Login &#187;" class="primary" /> <%= end_form_tag %> </div>

When I change to this :

<% form_tag :action => 'login' do %> (...same form fields...) <% end %>

then on my production machine, I get no HTML output at ALL. No errors in the log file, nothing. The layout renders, and the HTML produced looks like this:

... <div title="Account login" id="loginform" class="form"> <h1>Please Sign In</h1>

</div> ...

So the output of the whole <% form_tag :action... do %> ... <% end %> is just AWOL.

Now, on my development machine, these produce identical HTML output; the form shows up and works fine whether I use the old deprecated <%= start_form_tag ...%> or the new-and-hotness <% form_tag ... do %>.

Can someone shed some light on where I might look to find the problem? It seems perhaps I don't have the proper version of *something* on one of the servers, but frankly, I don't know how to determine that.

Thanks for any suggestions!

2

Ryan Waldron wrote:

I've got two servers, both with Rails 1.1.6 on them. I'm trying to remove some of the newly-deprecated stuff in my app, and I've run into a problem. My login page used to look like this:

[snip]

When I change to this :

<% form_tag :action => 'login' do %> (...same form fields...) <% end %>

The difference might be <%= instead of <%

Use <%= if you want the output rendered.

Long www.edgesoft.ca/blog/read/2

3

No, that's for the old-style usage; this is the new block-style usage of form_tag (see http://www.loudthinking.com/arc/000601.html ). Not only does <%= not help, it actually generates a Rails error.

4

Well, as is so often the case, by finally giving up and posting to a public list, within minutes I was able to finally figure out what was wrong.

I was tripped up by the fact that the 1.2 RC1 is still numbered as a 1.1.6 branch (1.1.6.5618 at the moment), and I had NOT installed Rails from gems.rubyonrails.org. Thought I had. Duh.

If I weren't so happy to have this working now, I'd be embarrassed. :slight_smile: Move along, nothing to see here. :slight_smile:

5

Ryan Waldron wrote:

> [snip] > > > > When I change to this : > > > > <% form_tag :action => 'login' do %> > > (...same form fields...) > > <% end %> > > > The difference might be <%= instead of <% > > Use <%= if you want the output rendered.

No, that's for the old-style usage; this is the new block-style usage of form_tag (see http://www.loudthinking.com/arc/000601.html ). Not only does <%= not help, it actually generates a Rails error.

My bad. So is this what is new in 1.2?

Regardless of version, are there advantages to using the form_tag... construct instead of plain HTML (e.g. <form ...>...</form>)?

Long www.edgesoft.ca/blog/read/2

6

Ryan Waldron wrote:

[snip]

> No, that's for the old-style usage; this is the new block-style usage > of form_tag (see http://www.loudthinking.com/arc/000601.html ). Not

My bad. So is this what is new in 1.2?

This is one of several things coming in 1.2. You can find much more at Ruby on Rails — Rails 1.2 RC1: New in ActiveRecord and Ruby on Rails — Rails 1.2: Release Candidate 1 and all over the place.

Regardless of version, are there advantages to using the form_tag... construct instead of plain HTML (e.g. <form ...>...</form>)?

Well, one notable advantage is that you can let Rails properly build the URL to which you want to POST your form by indicating the controller and action and other such things by symbol or by name. I would hate to have to build those things manually everywhere. <% form_tag :controller=>'notes', :action=>'list', :id=@user do %>...<% end %> is so much easier.

There are lots of reasons that form_tag is your friend. You just have to match up the version of it that you're using with the version of Rails that you actually installed on your server. :slight_smile: