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victor - 9:39 pm on Dec 25, 2003 (gmt 0)
True, that a database usually needs to hold only validated data in a predetermined format. But it is not necessarily good practice to assume that a user will spend the time to learn the precise format you want. They may give up and go to a site that is less finicky. If a user enters a date on one of my sites, I'll take any of these (and more besides) and convert it to the format I want internally: If they enter something ambiguous (eg 4/5/6), I highlight it and show them how I've interpreted it. I also write all cgi validation messages and the field values that prompted them to an application log file. I analyze that, and if I can see mistakes being made, I improve the validation and/or make the explanatory text clearer. I suspect a great many forms (and thus sales) get abandoned because people get frustrated at having to contort their natural way of doing things to the way a particular site wants it. It is not hard work at all to write bullet-proof validation and conversion routines. And, I reckon, there is a commercial advantage to doing so. That's easy to confirm by checking the number of errors you throw out before a form is abandoned.
The fact is, the data entered must ALSO be usable, and that means there must be some kinds of restrictions on form entry for the same (seemingly helpless) minions we're supposed to be building sites for.
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