Validation properties

You can control validation by setting properties on the Validate and Parser Options tabs for the nodes that are listed in the following table.

Validation options are available on the following nodes:
Node type Nodes with validation options
Input node MQInput, SCADAInput, HTTPInput, JMSInput, TimeoutNotification, ,
Output node MQOutput, MQReply, SCADAOutput, HTTPReply, JMSOutput, JMSReply, ,
Other nodes Compute, Mapping, JavaCompute, Validate, ResetContentDescriptor, MQGet, HTTPRequest, , , ,

For an overview of message validation in the broker, refer to Validating messages.

You can set the properties that are shown in the following table.
Tab Properties that affect validation
Validation Validate, Failure Action, Include All Value Constraints, Fix
Parser Options Parse Timing

Validation tab properties

Validate

Sets whether validation is required. All nodes provide the following options:

None
The default value. No validation is performed.
Content
Indicates that you want to perform content checks, such as Content validation and Composition.
Content and Value
Indicates that you want to perform content checks, such as Content validation and Composition, and value checks, such as whether the value conforms to data type, length, range, and enumeration.

Some nodes also provide the following option:

Inherit
Instructs the node to use all the validation options that are provided with the input message tree in preference to any supplied on the node. Inherit therefore resolves to None, Content, or Content And Value. If Inherit is selected, the other validation properties on the tab are not available.

Failure Action

The action that you want to be taken when a validation failure occurs. You can set it to the following values:

Exception
The default value. An exception is thrown on the first validation failure encountered. The resulting exception list is shown below. The failure is also logged in the user trace if you have asked for user tracing of the message flow, and validation stops. Use this setting if you want processing of the message to halt as soon as a failure is encountered.

MRM and IDOCException list when failure action set to Exception

Exception List
Throws an exception if validation failures are encountered, but only when the current parsing or writing operation has completed. The resulting exception list is shown below. Each failure is also logged in the user trace if you have asked for user tracing of the message flow, and validation stops. Use this setting if you want processing of the message to halt if a validation failure occurs, but you want to see the full list of failures encountered. This property is affected by the Parse Timing property; when partial parsing is selected the current parsing operation parses only a portion of an input message, so only the validation failures in that portion of the message are reported.

MRM and IDOCException list when failure action set to Exception List

User Trace
Logs all validation failures to the user trace, even if you have not asked for user tracing of the message flow. Use this setting if you want processing of the message to continue regardless of validation failures.
Local Error Log
Logs all validation failures to the error log (for example, the Event Log on Windows). Use this setting if you want processing of the message to continue regardless of validation failures.

Include All Value Constraints

The check box is selected. You cannot change this option.

Include All Value Constraints specifies which basic value constraint checks are to be performed on the values of fields in the message when Validate resolves to Content And Value. The checks performed are:

  • Min Length
  • Max Length
  • Fraction Digits
  • Total Digits
  • Min Inclusive
  • Max Inclusive
  • Min Exclusive (where supported)
  • Max Exclusive (where supported)
  • Enumeration
  • Pattern

For more details on value constraints, see Simple type logical value constraints.

Fix

The default value is none. You cannot change it.

None specifies that no extra remedial action is to be taken when Validate resolves to Content or Content And Value and validation failures occur. The remedial action that is taken depends on the setting of Failure Action.

If Failure Action is set to User Trace or Local Error Log, the remedial action is limited to the default remedial action that takes place when no validation is being performed, as described in Validating messages:

  • Extraneous fields are discarded on output for fixed formats (CWF and TDS fixed length models only).
  • If mandatory content is missing, default values are supplied, if available, on output for fixed formats (CWF and TDS fixed length models only).
  • If an element's data type in the tree does not match that specified in the dictionary, the data type is converted on output to match the dictionary definition, if possible, for all formats.

If Failure Action is set to Exception or Exception List, the remedial action is limited to the third item in the above list, and an exception is thrown for the first two items.

Parser Options tab properties

Parse Timing

The Parse Timing property determines whether on demand parsing is to be used when parsing a message. It also gives you control over the timing of input message validation:

  • If you select a Parse Timing value of On Demand, validation of a field in the message is delayed until it is parsed by on demand parsing.
  • If you select a Parse Timing value of Immediate, on demand parsing is overridden, and everything in the message is parsed and validated except, if the message domain is MRM, those complex types with a Composition of Choice or Message that can not be resolved at the time
  • If you select a Parse Timing value of Complete, on demand parsing is overridden, and everything is parsed and validated. If the message domain is MRM, complex types with a Composition of Choice or Message that can not be resolved at the time cause a validation failure.

If you enable message validation, and you select On Demand or Immediate for Parse Timing, validation errors might not be detected until later in the processing of a message by a message flow, or might never be detected if a portion of the message is never parsed. To make sure that all fields in a message are validated, either select Complete or, if the message domain is MRM, select Immediate and make sure that you resolve all unresolved types with a Composition of Choice or Message at the start of your message flow.

The Parse Timing property has no effect on the validation of output messages.

Related reference
Built-in nodes
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Copyright IBM Corporation 1999, 2009Copyright IBM Corporation 1999, 2009.
Last updated : 2009-01-07 15:20:24

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