Hibernate Validator annotations not working

Question

I just added hibernate-validator-5.1.3.Final.jar to my classpath and annotated a POJO:

public class Person {
    @NotNull
    private String name;

    // etc...
}

Then I went to test it out with a driver:

public class Driver {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Person p = new Person();
        p.setName(null);
    }
}

This executes without throwing any validation errors - where am I going awry?

Answer 1

You should run the validation engine to check if it is valid or not:

public class Driver {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Person p = new Person();
        p.setName(null);

      ValidatorFactory factory = Validation.buildDefaultValidatorFactory();
      Set<ConstraintViolation<Person>> constraints = factory.getValidator().validate(p);
        // constraint will have the results of validation

    }
}

You also need to add javax.validation:validation-api to your classpath. Most of the frameworks do these validation logics behind the scene for avoiding boilerplate codes.