Add validation to a MediatR behavior pipeline?

Question

I'm using ASP.NET Core, the built-in container, and MediatR 3 which supports "behavior" pipelines:

public class MyRequest : IRequest<string>
{
    // ...
}

public class MyRequestHandler : IRequestHandler<MyRequest, string>
{
    public string Handle(MyRequest message)
    {
        return "Hello!";
    }
}

public class MyPipeline<TRequest, TResponse> : IPipelineBehavior<TRequest, TResponse>
{
    public async Task<TResponse> Handle(TRequest request, RequestHandlerDelegate<TResponse> next)
    {
        var response = await next();
        return response;
    }
}

// in `Startup.ConfigureServices()`:
services.AddTransient(typeof(IPipelineBehavior<MyRequest,str‌​ing>), typeof(MyPipeline<MyRequest,string>))

I need a FluentValidation validator in the pipeline. In MediatR 2, a validation pipeline was created thus:

public class ValidationPipeline<TRequest, TResponse>
    : IRequestHandler<TRequest, TResponse>
    where TRequest : IRequest<TResponse>
{

    public ValidationPipeline(IRequestHandler<TRequest, TResponse> inner, IEnumerable<IValidator<TRequest>> validators)
    {
        _inner = inner;
        _validators = validators;
    }

    public TResponse Handle(TRequest message)
    {
        var failures = _validators
            .Select(v => v.Validate(message))
            .SelectMany(result => result.Errors)
            .Where(f => f != null)
            .ToList();
        if (failures.Any())
            throw new ValidationException(failures);
        return _inner.Handle(request);
    }

}

How do I do that now for the new version? How do I set which validator to use?

Answer 1

The process is exactly the same, you just have to change the interface to use the new IPipelineBehavior<TRequest, TResponse> interface.

public class ValidationBehavior<TRequest, TResponse> : IPipelineBehavior<TRequest, TResponse>
    where TRequest : IRequest<TResponse>
{
    private readonly IEnumerable<IValidator<TRequest>> _validators;

    public ValidationBehavior(IEnumerable<IValidator<TRequest>> validators)
    {
        _validators = validators;
    }

    public Task<TResponse> Handle(TRequest request, RequestHandlerDelegate<TResponse> next)
    {
        var context = new ValidationContext(request);
        var failures = _validators
            .Select(v => v.Validate(context))
            .SelectMany(result => result.Errors)
            .Where(f => f != null)
            .ToList();

        if (failures.Count != 0)
        {
            throw new ValidationException(failures);
        }

        return next();
    }
}

For the validators, you should register all the validators as IValidator<TRequest> in the built-in container so they'll be injected in the behavior. If you don't want to register them one by one, I suggest that you have a look at the great Scrutor library that brings assembly scanning capabilities. This way it'll find your validators itself.

Also, with the new system, you don't use the decorator pattern anymore, you just register your generic behavior in the container and MediatR will pick it up automatically. It could look something like:

var services = new ServiceCollection();
services.AddMediatR(typeof(Program));
services.AddTransient(typeof(IPipelineBehavior<,>), typeof(ValidationBehavior<,>));
var provider = services.BuildServiceProvider();

Answer 2

I've packed .net core integration into nuget, feel free to use it: https://www.nuget.org/packages/MediatR.Extensions.FluentValidation.AspNetCore

Just insert in configuration section:

services.AddFluentValidation(new[] {typeof(GenerateInvoiceHandler).GetTypeInfo().Assembly});

GitHub