Simple Widget plugin update function in WP_Widget not working [closed]

Question

I've been following along a Lynda.com tutorial on plugin development and copied the plugin in the video to get an understanding of how they work. When I try to save the simple widget which basically just puts a title and some text in a widget area.

Following the code from the tutorial found here (Chapter 4) this is what I have.

class SimpleWidget extends WP_Widget
{
    function SimpleWidget()
    {
        $widget_options = array(
            'classname' => 'simple-widget',
            'description' => 'Just a simple widget'
        );

        parent::WP_Widget('simple_widget','Simple Widget', $widget_options);
    }

    function widget($args, $instance)
    {
        extract($args, EXTR_SKIP);
        $title = ($instance['title']) ? $instance['title'] : 'A Simple Widget';
        $body = ($instance['body']) ? $instance['body']: 'A simple message';
        ?>
        <?php echo $before_widget; ?>
        <?php echo $before_title . $title . $after_title; ?>
        <p><?php echo $body; ?></p>
        <?php   
    }



    function form( $instance )
    {
        ?>
        <p><label for="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('title'); ?>">
        Title: </label><br />
        <input id="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('title'); ?>" 
                name="<?php $this->get_field_name('title'); ?>"
                value="<?php echo esc_attr($instance['title']); ?>" /></p>


        <p><label for="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('body'); ?>">Body:</label><br />
            <textarea id="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('body'); ?>" 
                name="<?php $this->get_field_name('body'); ?>" ><?php echo esc_attr($instance['body']); ?></textarea></p>  
        <?php
    }
}

function simple_widget_init()
{
    register_widget("SimpleWidget");
}

add_action('widgets_init', 'simple_widget_init');

?>

In the video, he mentions that by removing function update() the widget will still update...and in the video it does...but when I try so save text in the widget, it doesn't work...it just comes back blank.

I have also tried adding function update() as shown below with no luck either:

function update($new_instance, $old_instance) {
        $instance = $old_instance;

        $instance['title'] = strip_tags( $new_instance['title'] );
        $instance['body'] = strip_tags( $new_instance['body'] );

        return $instance;
    }

Any suggestions for a beginning plugin developer why this isn't saving at all?

Other pertinent information Wordpress Build: 3.3.1

EDIT: Fixed an erroneous line of pasted code.

Answer 1

So the reason that the form wasn't updating was because I neglected to echo the php in the name.

So name="<?php $this->get_field_name('title'); ?>" changed to name="<?php echo $this->get_field_name('title'); ?>"

and that solved my problem for both the title and body input portions.

I am now able to save and update to my hearts content!