Validation on enum in spring request

Question

I have a request WorkerRequest in which there is an enum which has FULL_TIME, MANAGER and so on.

In WorkerRequest how can I apply the length validation on this enum?

Example: enum type should not be greater than 8 characters.

FULL_TIME valid (8 characters)

PERMANENT invalid (9 characters)

Currently if I put javax.validation.constraints.Size

  @Size(min = 0, max = 8, message = "Allowed length for workerType is 8.")
  @Enumerated(EnumType.STRING)
  private WorkerType workerType;

it throws an error :

HV000030: No validator could be found for constraint 'javax.validation.constraints.Size' validating type 'com.XX.XX.XX.WorkerType'. Check configuration for 'workerType'

Solution

As described in Difference between @Size, @Length and @Column(length=value)

@Size is a Bean Validation annotation that validates that the associated String has a value whose length is bounded by the minimum and maximum values.

You can only specify the the maximum required length for persisting enum value in your db. For example, if you define @Column(length = 8) instead of @Size you will see workerType VARCHAR(8) in your db definition correspondingly.

But there is a workaround for it: suppose you have

 public enum WorkerType {PERMANENT , FULL_TIME, ...}; 

1. Define a custom validation annotation:

   @Target(ElementType.FIELD)
   @Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
   @Constraint(validatedBy = EnumSizeLimit.class)
   public @interface EnumSizeLimit {
       String message() default "{com.example.app.EnumSizeLimit.message}";
       Class<?>[] groups() default {};
       Class<? extends Payload>[] payload() default {};
       Class<? extends Enum<?>> targetClassType();
   }
   

2. Implement a Validator:

   public class EnumSizeLimitValidator implements ConstraintValidator < EnumSizeLimit , String > {
        private Set < String > allowedValues;
   
        @SuppressWarnings({
            "unchecked",
            "rawtypes"
        })
       @Override
       public void initialize(EnumSizeLimit targetEnum) {
       Class << ? extends Enum > enumSelected = targetEnum.targetClassType();
       allowedValues = (Set < String > ) EnumSet.allOf(enumSelected).stream().map(e - > ((Enum << ? extends Enum << ? >> ) e).name())
           .collect(Collectors.toSet());
       }
   
       @Override
       public boolean isValid(String value, ConstraintValidatorContext context) {
           return value == null || (value.length>=0 && value.length<=8)) ? true : false;
       }
   }
   

3. Define Field:

   @EnumSizeLimit (targetClassType = WorkerType.class, message = "your message" 
   private String workerType;