Hey all, I''ve been checking out ruby and rails for a couple weeks now, and did both the onLamp and 4 days on rails tutorials. So far the ride has been great. I''ve asked this question in #rubyonrails before, but never got a real answer: In both tutorials (onLamp and 4DaysOnRails), there seems to be 2 ways of validating data and then informing the user. The first way is through the model, using the various validate_ methods. The second way is through the controller, using flash[''notice''] to inform the user of a changed status (new record, edited record, etc). The question I have is when you want to validate form fields that are not directly related to the model. Or just pretend that your web application does not use a database. In this instance, how do you validate form data, such as required fields, minimum max lengths, etc? How do you correspondingly inform the user of errors while validating? Some suggestions I got were: use flash[''notice''] append to errors object <- does this exist? is this possible? build my own =) Any responses greatly appreciated. Thank you everyone, Jin Lee