personally I would create some sort of message area similar to the cms

These shows up when a check is failed on the server side.

you will spot a tiny error message by the build field

May be make them more visible, like adding red background and etc?

He does have a point about having messages in a designated container that's clearly visible instead of in small areas scattered on the page.

Its fairly standard practice to do it that way

Shouldn't there be a client-side validator preventing the form from even being submitted if required information is not present? Or, do I misunderstand the issue?

The issue is where the notification is on screen that you have to complete a field

I would suggest an area "close to" the button that you are clicking to submit, that gets "tainted red" or something if there are validation errors (or the button itself).

BTW, the CMS has similar issues when there are validation errors in a tab that does not have the focus - how is that handled ?

IMO that's a standard to have client-side JS validation errors near the incorrect fields.

Yes, but those errors might not be "visible" when the user actually "clicks" the submit button, so apparently "nothing happens".

Which is exactly what I observed.

But it is incredibly easy to do blind usability testing to prove my point

IMO that's a standard to have client-side JS validation errors near the incorrect fields.

Agreed. http://jquery.bassistance.de/validate/demo/ is a good exmaple.

Would something like the following help?

I think that @brianteeman propose the following:

1. Make errors more visible.
2. Show additional error on the top that form is invalid.

Correct?

yes

but to use the examples from @betweenbrain see
http://jquery.bassistance.de/validate/demo/errorcontainer-demo.html

@brianteeman would it be enough or we also need big error message on the top?

I still think we need the big message at the top myself. I just would never see it if it was just over on the right and potentially above or below the fold

@brianteeman this will be good?

The problem is that I can't make this message translatable, because it's inside the JS. The only way to translate it is to place it inside the div, but this way it will stay there permanently :)

Just shooting blind here... but can the error message be generated by inline JS with the message created by PHP?

There are other areas where translatable strings are used in JavaScript files.
Let's first worry about how and where to display the validation messages in a way that they are visible.
We'll then find out how to translate them - I promise ;)

I believe the red message box stating that there are invalid fields is pretty neat.

Well if @brianteeman agree I will push the changes then :)

Seems that @brianteeman ok with it. Silence means yes ?

@b2z sorry I was taking some time offline. Your proposal is great.

ok ;) it was pushed already ?

I saw but thought it was polite to reply - and I try to be polite