Validation

This tutorial shows a concrete example of using typed errors to implement domain validation. In particular, we begin with the following domain:

data class Author(val name: String)
data class Book(val title: String, val authors: NonEmptyList<Author>)

over which we want to implement the following rules:

1. The given title should not be empty,
2. The list of authors should not be empty,
3. None of the author names should be empty.

We want to accumulate as many error as possible.

Smart constructors

The Author class exposes its constructor, so we cannot prevent from creating wrong values. One could introduce a require in the constructor, but we prefer to use the typed error mechanism instead. A common pattern in this case is to hide the constructor, and provide a smart constructor by adding an invoke operator in the companion.

object EmptyAuthorName

data class Author private constructor(val name: String) {
  companion object {
    operator fun invoke(name: String): Either<EmptyAuthorName, Author> = TODO()
  }
}

This way the users of this class still use Author("me") to create a new name, in the same way one would use a constructor, but actually our invoke function is called. This allows us to refine the type to an Either, which can return an error. The implementation uses the either computation block, with ensure describing the constraint #3.

data class Author private constructor(val name: String) {
  companion object {
    operator fun invoke(name: String): Either<EmptyAuthorName, Author> = either {
      ensure(name.isNotEmpty()) { EmptyAuthorName }
      Author(name)
    }
  }
}

Fail-first vs. accumulation

We are going to use a similar approach for Book, introducing a smart constructor. We have several different errors, though, which we define as a hierarchy. Note that EmptyAuthor is a different type than before, since we want to accommodate the index of the author.

sealed interface BookValidationError
object EmptyTitle: BookValidationError
object NoAuthors: BookValidationError
data class EmptyAuthor(val index: Int): BookValidationError

data class Book private constructor(
  val title: String, val authors: NonEmptyList<Author>
) {
  companion object {
    operator fun invoke(
      title: String, authors: Iterable<String>
    ): Either<BookValidationError, Book> = TODO()
  }
}

Let's forget about validating each author for a moment, and just implement the emptiness checks for the title and the authors list. Note that in the latter case we perform both the check and the conversion to NonEmptyList in a single go using ensureNotNull.

data class Book private constructor(
  val title: String, val authors: NonEmptyList<Author>
) {
  companion object {
    operator fun invoke(
      title: String, authors: Iterable<String>
    ): Either<BookValidationError, Book> = either {
      ensure(title.isNotEmpty()) { EmptyTitle }
      ensureNotNull(authors.toNonEmptyListOrNull()) { NoAuthors }
      Book(title, TODO())
    }
  }
}

This code has a problem, though: it only returns one error, even if there are two problems with the data of the Book. We would rather use an accumulation approach, so we can give back as much information as possible to the user. This requires two changes to the code:

• The result type is now a NonEmptyList of problems,
• We need to wrap the different validations in zipOrAccumulate.

data class Book private constructor(
  val title: String, val authors: NonEmptyList<Author>
) {
  companion object {
    operator fun invoke(
      title: String, authors: Iterable<String>
    ): Either<NonEmptyList<BookValidationError>, Book> = either {
      zipOrAccumulate(
        { ensure(title.isNotEmpty()) { EmptyTitle } },
        { ensureNotNull(authors.toNonEmptyListOrNull()) { NoAuthors } }
      ) { _, _ ->
        Book(title, TODO())
      }
    }
  }
}

The result of each of the arguments of zipOrAccumulate are available in the trailing lambda. In this case we are not using them: we have the title already available, and for the list of authors we still need to perform the conversion from String to Author.

Arguments to zipOrAccumulate

All but the last argument to zipOrAccumulate represent the different validations we want to run aggregating their output. Those arguments are often blocks wrapped in { curly braces }, which is a bit unusual for most Kotliners.

Validating a list

The next step is turning the given authors, which is a list of Strings, into a list of Authors. We need to run the smart constructor, thus, but at the same time we should accumulate any potential problems. Since this is related to author checks, we'll include this as part of the second validation.

data class Book private constructor(
  val title: String, val authors: NonEmptyList<Author>
) {
  companion object {
    operator fun invoke(
      title: String, authors: Iterable<String>
    ): Either<NonEmptyList<BookValidationError>, Book> = either {
      zipOrAccumulate(
        { ensure(title.isNotEmpty()) { EmptyTitle } },
        { 
          val validatedAuthors = mapOrAccumulate(authors.withIndex()) { nameAndIx ->
            Author(nameAndIx.value)
              .recover { _ -> raise(EmptyAuthor(nameAndIx.index)) }
              .bind()
          }
          ensureNotNull(validatedAuthors.toNonEmptyListOrNull()) { NoAuthors }
        }
      ) { _, authorsNel ->
        Book(title, authorsNel)
      }
    }
  }
}

This additional check is quite complex, so let's unravel it step by step:

• We use authors.withIndex() to create an iterable containing the values in conjunction with the index they live in, this is necessary to create the right EmptyAuthor error value.
• With mapOrAccumulate we state that we want to perform some validation over a collection of elements, accumulating each possible error.
• The call to Author(it.value) return an Either with the wrong error type (EmptyAuthorName instead of EmptyAuthor). To transform this value we use the recover extension function.

Recover vs. Map Left

Another possibility would be to use mapLeft { EmptyAuthor(it.index) }. The difference between recover and mapLeft is that the latter only transforms the error value, whereas in the former you can use any typed error computation.

• Finally, we use .bind() to embed the Either into the computation block. Essentially, every time you are using a value of type Either inside an either (or any other Raise block), such a call is required.

The result of the mapping is a List<Author>, that we can now use to create the final Book. This value is available in the last lambda of zipOrAccumulate, that we've called validatedAuthors in the code above.

Variants of map + accumulation

In the code above there's one section which can be written in several different ways, namely the mapping over a list while accumulating any errors raised during the processing of each of the elements.

val validatedAuthors = mapOrAccumulate(authors.withIndex()) { nameAndIx ->
  Author(nameAndIx.value)
    .mapLeft { EmptyAuthor(nameAndIx.index) }
    .bind()
}

This first version uses the variant of mapOrAccumulate which lives in Raise and takes the collection to work on as first argument. This variant provides Raise inside the block (hence the need to call .bind()), and raises automatically if any error is found.

Another way to write the code above is creating a list of Either using map, and then using .bindAll() at the very end. This often turns into simpler code when your validations use wrapper types, as we do here, since you don't need to call the intermediate .bind().

val validatedAuthors = authors.withIndex().map { nameAndIx ->
  Author(nameAndIx.value)
    .mapLeft { EmptyAuthor(nameAndIx.index) }
}.bindAll()

Any of these approaches are equivalent, given that the function that validates each of the elements doesn't perform any side effects.