MVC3 Razor Partial view render does not include data- validation attributes - asp.net-mvc-3

Question

I have a farily straight forward form that renders personal data as a partial view in the center of the form. I can not get client side validation to work on this form.
I started chasing down the generate html and came up with the same model field rendered on a standard form and a partial view.
I noticed that the input elements are correctly populated on the first call, #html.partial, the following only happens when the partialview is reloaded via an ajax request.
First the header of my partial view, this is within a Ajax.BeginForm on the main page.
#model MvcMPAPool.ViewModels.EventRegistration
<script src="#Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.js")" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script src="#Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.unobtrusive.js")" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
$(document).ready(function ()
{
$(".phoneMask").mask("[phone]");
});
</script>
#{
var nPhn = 0;
var dTotal = 0.0D;
var ajaxOpts = new AjaxOptions{ HttpMethod="Post", UpdateTargetId="idRegistrationSummary", OnSuccess="PostOnSuccess" };
Html.EnableClientValidation( true );
Html.EnableUnobtrusiveJavaScript( true );
}
Here is the razor markup from the partial view:
#Html.ValidationMessageFor(model=>Model.Player.Person.Addresses[0].PostalCode)
<table>
<tr>
<td style="width:200px;">City*</td>
<td>State</td>
<td>Zip/Postal Code</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>#Html.TextBoxFor(p=>Model.Player.Person.Addresses[0].CityName, new { style="width:200px;", maxlength=50 })</td>
<td>
#Html.DropDownListFor(p=> Model.Player.Person.Addresses[0].StateCode
, MPAUtils.GetStateList(Model.Player.Person.Addresses[0].StateCode))</td>
<td>
<div class="editor-field">
#Html.TextBoxFor(p=>Model.Player.Person.Addresses[0].PostalCode, new { style="width:80px;", maxlength=10 })
</div>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
Here is the rendered field from the partial view:
<td>
<div class="editor-field">
<input id="Player_Person_Addresses_0__PostalCode" maxlength="10" name="Player.Person.Addresses[0].PostalCode" style="width:80px;" type="text" value="" />
</div>
</td>
Here is the same model field rendered in a standard view:
<div class="editor-field">
<input data-val="true" data-val-length="The field Postal/Zip Code must be a string with a maximum length of 10." data-val-length-max="10" data-val-required="Postal or Zip code must be provided!" id="Person_Addresses_0__PostalCode" maxlength="10" name="Person.Addresses[0].PostalCode" title="Postal/Zip Code is required" type="text" value="" />
<span class="field-validation-valid" data-valmsg-for="Person.Addresses[0].PostalCode" data-valmsg-replace="true"></span>
</div>
Notice that the partial view rendering has no data-val-xxx attributes on the input element.
Is this correct? I do not see how the client side validation could work without these attributes, or am I missing something basic here?

Answer 1

In order to create the unobtrusive validation attributes, a FormContext must exist. Add the following at the top of your partial view:
if (this.ViewContext.FormContext == null)
{
this.ViewContext.FormContext = new FormContext();
}

Answer 2

If you want the data validation tags to be there, you need to be in a FormContext. Hence, if you're dynamically generating parts of your form, you need to include the following line in your partial view:
#{ if(ViewContext.FormContext == null) {ViewContext.FormContext = new FormContext(); }}
You then need to make sure you dynamically rebind your unobtrusive validation each time you add/remove items:
$("#form").removeData("validator");
$("#form").removeData("unobtrusiveValidation");
$.validator.unobtrusive.parse("#form");