Is the DataTypeAttribute validation working in MVC2?

Question

As far as I know the System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations.DataTypeAttribute not works in model validation in MVC v1. For example,

public class Model
{
  [DataType("EmailAddress")]
  public string Email {get; set;}
}

In the codes above, the Email property will not be validated in MVC v1. Is it working in MVC v2?

Answer 1

[DataType("EmailAddress")] doesn't influence validation by default. This is IsValid method of this attribute (from reflector):

public override bool IsValid(object value)
{
    return true;
}

This is example of custom DataTypeAttribute to validate Emails (taken from this site http://davidhayden.com/blog/dave/archive/2009/08/12/CustomDataTypeAttributeValidationCustomDisplay.aspx):

[AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Field | AttributeTargets.Property, AllowMultiple  = false)]
public class EmailAddressAttribute : DataTypeAttribute
{
    private readonly Regex regex = new Regex(@"\w+([-+.']\w+)*@\w+([-.]\w+)*\.\w+([-.]\w+)*", RegexOptions.Compiled);

    public EmailAddressAttribute() : base(DataType.EmailAddress)
    {

    }

    public override bool IsValid(object value)
    {

        string str = Convert.ToString(value, CultureInfo.CurrentCulture);
        if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(str))
            return true;

        Match match = regex.Match(str);   
        return ((match.Success && (match.Index == 0)) && (match.Length == str.Length));
    }
}

Answer 2

Like LukLed pointed out, DataTypeAttribute doesn't do any validation by default. But it does influence templates regarding how the data is presented.

For example if you call Html.DisplayFor() method on a model that has DataType(DataType.EmailAddress) attribute, it'll format its value with <a href="mailto:{0}">{0}</a> (at least in MVC RC2).

Answer 3

Alternatively, you can directly use RegularExpression attribute on your field instead of creating your own attribute that is in the end going to check for a regex matching.

[RegularExpression(@"\w+([-+.']\w+)*@\w+([-.]\w+)*\.\w+([-.]\w+)*", ErrorMessage = PaErrorMessages.InvalidEmailAddress)]
public string Email { get; set; }

Answer 4

Starting from .NET 4.5 there is EmailAddressAttribute, which has a correct implementation of the IsValid method. So if you're targeting .NET 4.5, then for validation please consider using the EmailAddressAttribute instead of a custom one. For example,

public class Model
{
    [EmailAddress(ErrorMessage = "INVALID EMAIL")]
    public string Email {get; set;}
}

And if you're curious about the implementation of EmailAddressAttribute, then here is the decompiled (using JetBrains dotPeek decompiler) source of the class:

using System;
using System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations.Resources;
using System.Text.RegularExpressions;

namespace System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations
{
  [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Property | AttributeTargets.Field | AttributeTargets.Parameter, AllowMultiple = false)]
  public sealed class EmailAddressAttribute : DataTypeAttribute
  {
    private static Regex _regex = new Regex("^((([a-z]|\\d|[!#\\$%&'\\*\\+\\-\\/=\\?\\^_`{\\|}~]|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])+(\\.([a-z]|\\d|[!#\\$%&'\\*\\+\\-\\/=\\?\\^_`{\\|}~]|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])+)*)|((\\x22)((((\\x20|\\x09)*(\\x0d\\x0a))?(\\x20|\\x09)+)?(([\\x01-\\x08\\x0b\\x0c\\x0e-\\x1f\\x7f]|\\x21|[\\x23-\\x5b]|[\\x5d-\\x7e]|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])|(\\\\([\\x01-\\x09\\x0b\\x0c\\x0d-\\x7f]|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF]))))*(((\\x20|\\x09)*(\\x0d\\x0a))?(\\x20|\\x09)+)?(\\x22)))@((([a-z]|\\d|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])|(([a-z]|\\d|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])([a-z]|\\d|-|\\.|_|~|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])*([a-z]|\\d|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])))\\.)+(([a-z]|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])|(([a-z]|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])([a-z]|\\d|-|\\.|_|~|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])*([a-z]|[\\u00A0-\\uD7FF\\uF900-\\uFDCF\\uFDF0-\\uFFEF])))\\.?$", RegexOptions.IgnoreCase | RegexOptions.ExplicitCapture | RegexOptions.Compiled);

    static EmailAddressAttribute()
    {
    }

    public EmailAddressAttribute()
      : base(DataType.EmailAddress)
    {
      this.ErrorMessage = DataAnnotationsResources.EmailAddressAttribute_Invalid;
    }

    public override bool IsValid(object value)
    {
      if (value == null)
        return true;
      string input = value as string;
      if (input != null)
        return EmailAddressAttribute._regex.Match(input).Length > 0;
      else
        return false;
    }
  }
}

Answer 5

Check out Scott Guthrie's blog post on MVC 2 validation. It is excellent. http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2010/01/15/asp-net-mvc-2-model-validation.aspx