An empty string is not null! Null means the value is missing, which is clearly not the case here. I would say Rails is exactly in the right here. When an HTML form is posted, empty input boxes are declared as empty strings, which what the user entered. The problem is not with Rails/ActiveRecord but with your form handling. If you want empty boxes to become null, add some client-side JavaScript logic that sets the "disabled" attribute on empty input elements before form is submitted; this will prevent the client from sending the value.
The user was presented an _opportunity_ to enter data and did not. The data is unknown. I don't know how you can say "...The user entered" an empty string. There is no empty string key on the keyboard. I have no idea why I got such hard pushback on this. This is the EXACT same behaviour other types use. If a number field is presented to the user and submitted with no value, NULL Is inserted. Not zero, which is the numeric equivalent of the empty string, but NULL. Same with date types. Why not say they entered '1/1/1970' by default if they entered nothing? http://dev.rubyonrails.org/ticket/3301 - Ian
Alexander.
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