Developer Guide to BPEL Designer: Validation

Last Updated: 23 October 2006
Contributed and maintained by Dmitry Markovski

Contents

Developer Guide to BPEL Designer

Validation

The BPEL Designer has a built-in BPEL code validation functionality that helps developers create well-formed, valid and standard-compliant code. The code is checked for errors and the user is notified if validation fails.

Validation Criteria

The Validator checks the BPEL process in accordance with the following criteria:

  1. For conformance with the BPEL 2.0 schema
  2. For compliance with static analysis rules defined in the WS-BPEL 2.0 specification
  3. For broken references
  4. For constructs that are valid per the BPEL 2.0 specification but are not yet supported by the Sun BPEL Service Engine

Validation Types

The BPEL Designer provides two types of validation:

Real-time validation

This type of validation is invoked automatically and does not require any explicit actions from the user. Only the current file is checked. The validation is performed in accordance with all the criteria mentioned above, except for validation for conformance with the BPEL 2.0 schema.

Explicit validation

This type of validation requires that the user explicitly invokes the validation process. All imported XSD and WSDL files are also checked. The validation is performed in accordance with all the criteria mentioned above.

To invoke explicit validation, do one of the following:

  • In the Source view, right-click the source to invoke the pop-up menu and choose Validate XML (Alt+Shift+F9)
  • In the Design view, click the Validate XML button (Alt+Shift+F9).

    Validate XML

Notifications

The user is notified about validation errors or success via:

The Output window

The results of validation appear in the Output window if validation has been invoked explicitly. If validation fails, the Output window contains errors and/or warnings:

Validation Failed

If validation is successful, there are no warnings or errors in the Output window.

The Design view

The Design view shows the results of both real-time and explicit validation. A red cross next to an element on the diagram means that the element has not passed validation and the output contains errors. A yellow triangle with an exclamation mark means that the element has not passed validation and the output contains warnings. If there are both errors and warnings, the Design view shows a red cross. If you click the cross or the triangle, a callout window appears with a list of errors and/or warnings:

Callout window

The callout window includes messages related to validation in accordance with all the criteria listed above. Messages related to the real-time validation are constantly updated. Messages related to the validation for conformance with the BPEL 2.0 schema, however, appear in the callout window and are updated only when you invoke the validation explicitly. This happens because validation for conformance with the BPEL 2.0 schema is not performed in real time.

The Navigator window

The Navigator window shows the results of both real-time and explicit validation by adding a red cross or a yellow triangle to the element's icon if validation has failed. For example, in the screenshot below, the AirlineReserved receive activity has not passed validation and the output contains errors.

Navigator - Validation Failed

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