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kotlinlang

I have two questions: (1) why is there an `@Validate` annotation given that Kotlin tries to avoid them (and the reflection based control flows that result from them) over explicit call chains; and (2) is it possible to inspect the validation constrains (in other words: are the validation constrains "just data" so we can write programs that, for instance, add a `max-length=X` attribute a HTML form element if there is a maxLength constraint on the field that backs up the form element)?

Hi <@U04V0U8VA2X>!

*(1)*

The annotation is unfortunately required to generate the code you use inside the validator. When you write :

```Validator&lt;Book&gt; {
    title.isNotEmpty()
}```
`title` here is not a property of the original `Book` class, but an extension property of the `Validatable&lt;Book&gt;` class

This extension property is generated by a KSP plugin. KSP is quite limited and needs the annotation to find the class for which the extension properties needs to be generated.

I plan to rewrite this someday to a FIR compiler plugin, which will allows to get rid of the annotation. But this is a huge step :slightly_smiling_face:

*(2)*

Akkurate was built with complex use-cases in mind. To help with this goal, it supports structured programming like conditions and loops.

Due to this conditional approach — determined at runtime — it is not possible to list all the constraints applied to a specific property, because they can change on each run.

However, I plan to support multiplatform, and allow you to run validation on client-side :wink: