Rules being checked after BO Save and triggering PropertyChanged

[mtavares628]

It looks like my validation rules are running again after the save of my business object is complete. I'm trying to figure out if this is something I'm inadvertently doing somewhere, or if this is by design. So, does BusinessBase run CheckRules again after an update? Further, it looks like some of my business rules are triggering OnPropertyChanged for the PrimaryProperty of the rule. Is this normal? I don't appear to be actually changing the property. Here's the rule:

private class LivingArrangementRequiresExplanation : CommonRules.NetsoftCommonBusinessRuleAsync
        {
            private IPropertyInfo AdvLivingArrangementIDProperty;

            public LivingArrangementRequiresExplanation(IPropertyInfo primaryProp, IPropertyInfo AdvLivingArrangementIDProp) : base(primaryProp)
            {
                AdvLivingArrangementIDProperty = AdvLivingArrangementIDProp;
                InputProperties = new List<IPropertyInfo>() { PrimaryProperty, AdvLivingArrangementIDProperty };
            }

            [System.Diagnostics.CodeAnalysis.SuppressMessage("Usage", "CSLA0017:Find Business Rules That Do Not Use Add() Methods on the Context", Justification = "<Pending>")]
            protected override async Task ExecuteAsync(IRuleContext context)
            {
                int advLivingArrangmentID = context.GetInputValue<int>(AdvLivingArrangementIDProperty);
                string LivingArrangementExplanation = context.GetInputValue<string>(PrimaryProperty);
                if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(LivingArrangementExplanation))
                {
                    var cmd = await DataPortal.CreateAsync<LivingArrangementRequiresExplanationCommand>(advLivingArrangmentID, NdrnCommon.GetUserAdvocacyGroup());
                    cmd = await DataPortal.ExecuteAsync<LivingArrangementRequiresExplanationCommand>(cmd);
                    if (cmd is object && cmd.RequiresExplanation)
                    {
                        string desc;
                        if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(GetMessage()))
                        {
                            desc = "The Living Arrangement selected requires an explanation";
                        }
                        else
                        {
                            desc = MessageText;
                        }
                        SetContext(context, desc);
                    }
                }
            }

            protected void SetContext(Csla.Rules.IRuleContext context, string desc)
        {
            SetContext(context, desc, Severity);
        }

        protected void SetContext(Csla.Rules.IRuleContext context, string desc, RuleSeverity sev)
        {
            switch (sev)
            {
                case RuleSeverity.Error:
                    {
                        context.AddErrorResult(desc);
                        break;
                    }

                case RuleSeverity.Information:
                    {
                        context.AddInformationResult(desc);
                        break;
                    }

                case RuleSeverity.Warning:
                    {
                        context.AddWarningResult(desc);
                        break;
                    }

                case RuleSeverity.Success:
                    {
                        context.AddSuccessResult(false);
                        break;
                    }
            }
        }
    }
        }

I'm not calling AddOutValue on the context, so I don't see why it would end up calling OnPropertyChanged for my ExplanationProperty. But if were to comment out this rule from running, then the PropertyChanged event isn't raised for my ExplanationProperty. This is happening with several rules that are hitting my database via a Command Object, but I don't see how that would generate a PropertyChanged even either. Any ideas?

[rockfordlhotka]

it looks like some of my business rules are triggering OnPropertyChanged for the PrimaryProperty of the rule

This is expected, because we don't have a way of knowing whether the UI needs refreshing based on the result of the rule (not the property value itself, but whether the UI is showing an info/warn/error message that needs to be updated).

[rockfordlhotka]

does BusinessBase run CheckRules again after an update?

Interesting. I created a simple test, and SaveAsync doesn't, but SaveAndMergeAsync does.

If I remember correctly, this is intended behavior, because we're merging the result of the update back into the original object graph, and the save operation may have changed property values on the logical server. As we merge those (potentially changed) property values back into the original object graph, it is necessary to rerun rules because the (potentially) new values might be different.

[mtavares628]

@rockfordlhotka it looks like IManageProperties is internal to the assembly, so I can't use it in my override.

[rockfordlhotka]

Oh, darn! You might want to create a type to do this work, so you can subclass ObjectFactory and make your life a bit easier. Sort of like:

using Csla.Core;

namespace Test
{
  public class GraphSuppressor : Csla.Server.ObjectFactory
  {
    public void SuppressRules(object obj)
    {
      if (obj is ICheckRules host)
        host.SuppressRuleChecking();
      var properties = Csla.Core.FieldManager.PropertyInfoManager.GetRegisteredProperties(obj.GetType());
      foreach (var property in properties)
        if (property.IsChild)
          SuppressRules(ReadProperty(obj, property));
    }
  }
}

[mtavares628]

Thanks Rocky. Unfortunately, there is no IsChild property on IPropertyInfo, I tried checking whether the property type is IEditableBusinessObject or IEditableCollection. However, it still wasn't suppressing for the child collections, so I think I'm missing that extra step to loop through the collection and suppress the rules for each child object. My issue now is that I'm not sure how to do that properly in a generic way. Here's what I currently have:

public class GraphSuppressor : Csla.Server.ObjectFactory
    {
        public void SuppressRules(object obj)
        {
            if (obj is ICheckRules host)
                host.SuppressRuleChecking();
            else if (obj is IEditableCollection childList)
            {
                // not sure what type to cast this to here to loop through on each object
                // since IEditableCollection doesn't implement IEnumerable
            }
            var properties = Csla.Core.FieldManager.PropertyInfoManager.GetRegisteredProperties(obj.GetType());
            foreach (var property in properties)
                if (property.Type is IEditableBusinessObject || property.Type is IEditableCollection)
                    SuppressRules(ReadProperty(obj, property));
        }
    }

What should I cast the collection to so that I can loop through the child objects?

[mtavares628]

Nevermind, I figured it out. I don't know why it didn't occur to me to just cast as IEnumerable itself to perform the loop. Here is what I ended up with:

public class GraphSuppressor : Csla.Server.ObjectFactory
    {
        public void SuppressRules(object obj)
        {
            if (obj is ICheckRules host)
                host.SuppressRuleChecking();
            else if (obj is IEditableCollection childList)
            {
                foreach (var item in (IEnumerable)childList)
                {
                    SuppressRules(item);
                }
            }
            var properties = Csla.Core.FieldManager.PropertyInfoManager.GetRegisteredProperties(obj.GetType());
            foreach (var property in properties)
            {
                var prop = ReadProperty(obj, property);
                if (prop is IEditableBusinessObject || prop is IEditableCollection)
                    SuppressRules(prop);
            }
                
        }

        public void ResumeRules(object obj)
        {
            if (obj is ICheckRules host)
                host.ResumeRuleChecking();
            else if (obj is IEditableCollection childList)
            {
                foreach (var item in (IEnumerable)childList)
                {
                    ResumeRules(item);
                }
            }
            var properties = Csla.Core.FieldManager.PropertyInfoManager.GetRegisteredProperties(obj.GetType());
            foreach (var property in properties)
            {
                var prop = ReadProperty(obj, property);
                if (prop is IEditableBusinessObject || prop is IEditableCollection)
                    ResumeRules(prop);
            }
        }
    }

[michaelcsikos]

Hi @rockfordlhotka, we have a situation where two child objects are validated by the parent. When using SaveAndMergeAsync this can fail as the second child object hasn't had its values merged in yet. Apart from avoiding SaveAndMergeAsync, is there something we can do to solve this?