validates_presence_of :start_date If I type "abcd" in the date field then the message comes that "start date can''t be empty". I understand that in the controller when the start_date is being populated nil is populated since the conversion failed. I guess the solution is to do check for the validity of the date field in the controller. I was wondering if there is a better way to handle this? But in this way the validation logic is spread across two tiers ( controllers and model). Thanks. -=- Neeraj _______________________________________________ Rails mailing list Rails-1W37MKcQCpIf0INCOvqR/iCwEArCW2h5@public.gmane.org http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails