Required Profile Fields in BP 1.5+ no longer give an option for a null value in the drop down, but become pre filled with the first option.

[rossagrant]

Required profile field behaviour has changed in BP 1.5

When a user is selecting an option from the drop down menu on a registration page the required fields are pre filled with the first option in the dropdown.

This means that incorrect data can be saved if a person overlooks a field and it also hinders other plugins that use this core functionality, such as BP Profile Search.

There used to be an option above each list of potential answers that showed as ---------

Thus there was a null option.

I have created this screencast to explain this a little easier:

​http://screenr.com/Fjrs

Boone suggested this solution but I am not a coder:

I would be happy to see a patch for BP that allows bp_get_the_profile_field_options() to take an argument along the lines of show_null_value_for_required (maybe not that wordy, but you get the idea). That way, we could default to false (1.5 behavior) but allow the 1.2.x behavior optionally, at ​http://buddypress.trac.wordpress.org/browser/trunk/bp-xprofile/bp-xprofile-template.php?annotate=blame&rev=5230#L431.

[boonebgorges]

I will try to get around to this, but it's puntable if no one manages to squeeze it in.

[boonebgorges]

(In [5552]) Adds 'null_on_required' param to bp_get_the_profile_field_options(), which will allow theme authors to display a blank option in a Required dropdown if they wish. Fixes #3698

[djpaul]

In 7599:

XProfile: Show the placeholder text for all select box profile fields.

Prior to BP 1.5, the "----" placeholder item for select boxes was shown for both optional and mandatory fields. In BP 1.5 in r4831, the behaviour was changed to only show the placeholder item for optional profile fields. With retrospect, that change didn’t make much sense.

This commits restores the original behaviour, showing the placeholder text for all select box profile fields. A user should be forced to pick an option for a required profile field, and not allow the web browser to automatically select the first option in the <select> element.

See #3378, #3698, and #5184. Props haykayltduk, hnla, DJPaul at WordCamp London contributor day!