Rails errors NOT showing up in f.error_messages, but in errors they are

Question

I have errors in a model that are showing up in the view when accessed with @model.errors. However, they do not show up if I try to do

  <%form_for @applicant do |f|%>
      <%=f.error_messages%> 
      This is zero, freakily: <%=f.error_messages.length%> 
      But this is not: <%[email protected]%>

however, the errors are present if I do

@applicant.errors.each

Any suggestions as to where I should look to resolve this? It's absolutely strange...

The form is working perfectly otherwise.

Edit: Thanks to ScottD's answer I figured out what was happening. I had simplified the question here on SO, but that was the problem. I was really doing this:

<%form_for @applicant.thinger do |f|%>

and therein lies the problem. The error_messages_for method that the form_helper calls needs the thing to be one level deep (meaning an instance variable like @applicant, which it then translates to :applicant, and never like @applicant.status). Thanks!

Answer 1

In this example f is not the @applicant object, it is the Form builder object. What you want is something like:

<%= error_messages_for 'applicant' %>

See the Rails API Docs.