So who gets the credits for the idea of the Validation framework?

In my article series on N-Layer design I credited AzamSharp for his article on creating a domain object validation framework. AzamSharp didn't cite any other resources so it looks as all the ideas presented in the article are his.

However, I recently found this (ancient, in Internet terms) article on MSDN about Using Custom Attributes for Validation. It was written by Jan Tielens for the MSDN site using .NET 1.1 and Visual Studio 2003 and was article of the day in October 2003 on www.asp.net.

So, should the real credits go to Jan instead of to AzamSharp? The similarities are too great to be ignored. Jan introduces the ValidatorAttribute base class, AzamSharp has a ValidationAttribute class. Both have an implemented Message property and an abstract IsValid method. Jan has a (non-generic) class responsible for validation called ValidationEngine and so has AzamSharp. However, he uses a generic version of the class which makes it a lot easier to reuse them, something Jan couldn't do because generics weren't available in .NET in 2003. Also, AzamSharp uses a collection of BrokenRule instances rather than a ValidationExceptionDetail. As you can see in my article series, I am using the concept of BrokenRule as well as I find it much more intuitive to work with than a collection of Exception instances. But, that's just a matter of choice.

So who gets the credits? Who wrote what or invented what wheel? Is it possible that two people came up with the same idea using almost the same names for things 5 years apart? Is that because the business domain language just points you in the right direction? (What other names for a validation attribute base class can you come up with? ;-) )

My guess is that AzamSharp read Jan's article some time ago and then wrote his own - more generic and practically applicable - version later. But, that's just a guess. If you know the true story, make yourself heard using the Talk Back feature at the end of this article.

 


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Doc ID 488
Full URL https://imar.spaanjaars.com/488/so-who-gets-the-credits-for-the-idea-of-the-validation-framework
Short cut https://imar.spaanjaars.com/488/
Written by Imar Spaanjaars
Date Posted 02/22/2009 20:11

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