How can I force jQuery Validate to check for duplicate username in database?

Question

I\'m coming into the middle of this project so I\'m having to do a bit of re-writing because of sloppy code. I am using jQuery 1.6.1 and Validate 1.8.1.

First, here\

Answer 1

Check when the validation function is getting called, what the value of username is and what the value of output is: is it true or "true"?

I'm guessing latter: a string, so you could just do:

return output === "true" ? true : false; // I sincerely recommend using === here

Since if you return "false"; will evaluate to true because it's a non-empty string - yay dynamic langauges! :/

Example with remote:

$("#signup").validate( {
    rules: {
        username: {
            required: true,
            minlength: 5,
            remote: {
                url: "dbquery.php",
                type: "get",
                data: {
                    action: function () {
                        return "checkusername";
                    },
                    username: function() {
                        var username = $("#username").val();
                        return username;
                    }
                }
            }
        }
    },
    messages: {
        username: {
            required: "Enter a username"
        }
    },
    submitHandler: function(form) {
        form.submit();
    }
});

To set a custom error message your PHP file must return the message instead of false, so echo "Sorry, this user name is not available" in your PHP file.