field format checker in issue editor ...

Hi;

I have implemented a small add on feature to Scarab. A field checker based
on regular
expressions. I originaly wanted to use intake for this purpose, but i could
not find out,
how to define dynamic rules with intake. so i modified ReportIssue.java and
ModifyIssue.java
instead. The concept is easy:

When you define a new attribute, you now can define an associated regular
expression,
which is used to check the field input for validity. If the format field is
kept empty in the attribute
definition, then no field checking is done during issue
creation/modification. Of course the regex 
is stored in the database along with the attribute.

Now there is one little caveat with this :

When a user enters a wrong value, an error message is generated "invalid
pattern used for field xxx"
and the regular expression is shown. Now this is good for developers, but
bad for customers.
Customers seem to not know about regular expressions. for instance:

    invalid value in field "daytime": "12.20". expected format is
"\d\d?:\d\d?"

Now it would be much more convenient to see something like this:

    invalid value in field "daytime": "12.20". expected format is "nn:nn"

which more people tend to understand immediately.


So i think about adding yet another field to the Attribute definition,
namely "patternHint" with a human  readable representation of whichever
format is expected.  And as another goodie this value could be used as
default value for the field:

Lets assume, the "patternHint" would be set to "nn:nn". Now Scarab uses this
value as default in the daytime field and if the user does not change the
value, scarab will complain:

    invalid value in field "daytime": "nn:nn". expected format is "nn:nn"

Now i could derive from the fact, that the value is invalid AND it is equal
to the default value, that
the correct error message would be:

   Please type a valid value into the field "daytime" and use the given
format "nn:nn"

All this can be done with Scarab and very little logic. Do you think this is
a good idea or does it feel
more like a hack ?

When i started this feature, i also thought it might be a good idea to
invent a new fieldType "daytime" but i quickly decided, that such an
implementation is not flexible enough. So i ended with the regex
implementation, which could be used in many other circumstances too.

otoh having a daytime widget like the calendar would be something valuable
in itself ...

comments appreciated.

regards, hussayn
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