To validate a property or a page means to check its value against certain rules, and add a message to the property or page if validation fails. An invalid page (a page that has any associated messages) usually cannot be stored into the database.
A validate rule is an instance of the Rule-Obj-Validate rule type. These rules test property values, typically immediately after they are submitted on a browser form.
Activities use the Obj-Validate method to call a validate rule to test a set of property values. Object validation is optional and occurs only when explicitly designed into your application. Object validation can enforce restrictions on values beyond those in the properties.
When a workstation user submits an HTML form to the PRPC server, existing page messages corresponding to the input are cleared, and property messages are cleared for any value that changed.
A custom activity can also check values on a clipboard page. A custom activity is necessary if the needed tests are more complex than can be recorded in a validate rule. Informally, activities created for this purpose are called validation activities.
A validation rule may reference edit validate rules (Rule-Edit-Validate rule type).