When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when you need to:

• Create validation rules to enforce data quality
• Prevent invalid records from being saved
• Generate validation rule metadata with formulas
• Add business logic validation to objects
• Troubleshoot deployment errors related to validation rules

Specification

ValidationRule Metadata Specification

Overview

Validation Rules are declarative metadata components used to enforce data quality and business logic in Salesforce. They evaluate a formula expression when a record is saved and prevent the save operation if the expression returns TRUE.

Purpose

-Enforce business rules at the data layer -Prevent invalid or incomplete records from being saved -Display meaningful error messages to guide users

Required Properties

Core Validation Rule Properties

• fullName

  • The unique API name of the validation rule
  • Must start with a letter
    • Can contain letters, numbers, and underscores
  • Cannot end with an underscore
  • Cannot contain consecutive underscores
  • Cannot exceed 40 character.

• active -Indicates whether the validation rule is enabled true → Rule is enforced false → Rule is inactive

• errorConditionFormula

• The logical formula that evaluates record data

• Must return TRUE or FALSE

• If TRUE, the validation rule triggers an error

• errorMessage

  • The message displayed to the user when validation fails

• Maximum length: 255 characters

Specific Function Guidelines

• TEXT - TEXT() function MUST NOT be used with Text fields, to fix this you can just remove the TEXT() function.
• CASE - In salesforce CASE() function, last parameter is the default value. Admins often miss to provide this and number of parameters to CASE() function are always even.
• VALUE - VALUE() function should only be used with Text fields. If a number is being used as a parameter to the VALUE() function, remove the VALUE() function.
• DAY - DAY() function should only be used with Date fields. If a Datetime field is being used as a parameter to the DAY() function, convert it into a Date first.
• MONTH - MONTH() function should only be used with Date fields. If a Datetime field is being used as a parameter to the MONTH() function, convert it into a Date first.
• DATEVALUE - DATEVALUE() function should only be used with DateTime fields. If a Date is being used as a parameter to the DATEVALUE() function, remove the DATEVALUE() function.
• ISPICKVAL - If checking equality of a picklist type field, the function ISPICKVAL() MUST be used.
• ISCHANGE - Use ISCHANGE() function to check the value of a record has changed.

Critical Rules

1. Formula XML Handling(MOST COMMON ERROR)

   • ANY errorConditionFormula containing XML tags MUST be inside a CDATA section in the metadata XML.

2. Interpretation of "Update" Instructions. When receiving instructions to modify a formula, distinguish between a replacement and an addition:

   • "Update the formula to [Action]": Completely replace the existing formula logic with the new requirement.
   • "Update the formula to also [Action]": Keep the existing logic and append the new requirement (usually by wrapping the logic in an AND() or OR() function).

3. File Format Requirement

   • Validation rule files MUST always use the .validationRule-meta.xml extension.