Problems with Hibernate Validator and Spring Webflow - validation

Question

I'm trying to validate a form using Spring WebFlow and Hibernate Validator Annotations, but I'm doing something wrong.
If I use the Spring validation way (ValidationContext, MessageContext, validate${state}, etc), all works fine, but I want to use the Hibernate Annotations like #Email, #NotEmpty, etc.
I've read a lot of forums, Spring documentation, but I don't know what I'm doing wrong.
At this moment, this is my view-state and next action code:
<var name="user" class="myproject.web.pojo.User"/>
<view-state id="startSignup" model="user">
<binder>
<binding property="email" />
<binding property="name" />
<binding property="lastName" />
<binding property="password" />
</binder>
<on-entry>
<set name="flowScope.user" value="new info.teaming.web.pojo.User()" />
</on-entry>
<transition on="dataEntered" to="lookupUser" />
</view-state>
<action-state id="lookupUser">
<evaluate expression="signupActions.lookupUser(user)" />
<transition to="startSignup" on-exception="myproject.web.service.exception.UserAlreadyExistsException" />
<transition to="saveOrder" />
</action-state>
(...)
This is the startSignup.jsp code:
<!-- sf:form method="POST" modelAttribute="user" -->
<sf:form method="POST" commandName="user" >
<input type="hidden" name="_flowExecutionKey" value="${flowExecutionKey}" />
<fieldset>
<table cellspacing="0">
<tr>
<th>
<label for="name"><fmt:message key="signUp.name"/></label>
</th>
<td>
<sf:input path="name" size="25" id="name" />
</td>
<sf:errors path="name" />
</tr>
<tr>
<th>
<label for="lastName"><fmt:message key="signUp.lastName"/></label>
</th>
<td>
<sf:input path="lastName" size="45" maxlength="45" id="lastName" />
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>
<label for="password"><fmt:message key="signUp.password"/></label>
</th>
<td>
<sf:password path="password" size="20" showPassword="true" id="password" />
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>
<label for="email"><fmt:message key="signUp.email"/></label>
</th>
<td>
<sf:input path="email" size="30" id="email" />
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<input type="submit" name="_eventId_dataEntered" value="<fmt:message key="signUp.register"/>"/>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</fieldset>
</sf:form>
This is the myproject.web.pojo.User POJO code:
import java.io.Serializable;
import org.hibernate.validator.constraints.Email;
import org.hibernate.validator.constraints.Length;
import org.hibernate.validator.constraints.NotEmpty;
public class User implements Serializable {
private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
#NotEmpty
#Length(min = 2, max = 25)
private String name;
#NotEmpty
#Email
private String email;
#NotEmpty
#Length(min = 2, max = 45)
private String lastName;
#NotEmpty
#Length(min = 6, max = 20)
private String password;
public String getName() {
return name;
}
public void setName(String name) {
this.name = name;
}
public String getEmail() {
return email;
}
public void setEmail(String email) {
this.email = email;
}
public void setPassword(String password) {
this.password = password;
}
public String getPassword() {
return password;
}
public void setLastName(String lastName) {
this.lastName = lastName;
}
public String getLastName() {
return lastName;
}
// public void validateStartSignup(ValidationContext context) {
// MessageContext messages = context.getMessageContext();
//
// messages.addMessage(new MessageBuilder().error().source("name").code("user.name.notEmpty").build());
// }
}
(note: as you can see, when I work with Spring Validation (uncomment the validate method), the form validates successfully)
And finally, this is my SignupAction code:
import myproject.web.model.UsrUser;
import myproject.web.model.dao.UsrUserDAO;
import myproject.web.pojo.User;
import myproject.web.service.exception.UserAlreadyExistsException;
import javax.annotation.Resource;
import javax.validation.Valid;
import org.springframework.stereotype.Component;
import org.springframework.webflow.action.MultiAction;
import org.springframework.webflow.execution.Event;
#Component
public class SignupActions extends MultiAction {
#Resource
UsrUserDAO usrUserDAO;
private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;
public Event lookupUser(#Valid User user) throws UserAlreadyExistsException {
try {
usrUserDAO.findByEmail(user.getEmail());
} catch (javax.persistence.NoResultException e) {
return success();
}
throw new UserAlreadyExistsException();
}
public void saveUser(UsrUser user) {
return;
}
}
When I work with Hibernate Validation, the flow arrives to the saveUser method, without any validation.
I'm using Spring 3:
Spring 3.0.5.RELEASE
Spring WebFlow 2.2.1.RELEASE
Hibernate Validator 4.0.2.GA
What I'm doing wrong?
Thanks a lot for helping me! :)

Answer 1

have you defined your validator in Spring configuration XML file?
According to Spring Webflow reference it shoud be defined like this:
<webflow:flow-registry flow-builder-services="flowBuilderServices" />
<webflow:flow-builder-services id="flowBuilderServices" validator="validator" />
<bean id="validator" class="org.springframework.validation.beanvalidation.LocalValidatorFactoryBean" />

Answer 2

Try,
Changing:
#Resource
UsrUserDAO usrUserDAO;
By:
#Autowired
private UsrUserManager UsrUserManager;
Using MVC manager.
And:
#Transactional
public Event lookupUser(#Valid User user) throws UserAlreadyExistsException { ...
as a Spring MVC controller, or reusing this MVC code if you already desing it ;)