An odd Sitecore field validator

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Today I faced a Sitecore website rollout problem I’ve never thought of before. When doing a multi language/multi market solution, it’s common to use cloning or other kinds of fallback techniques. This is typically very good, but sometimes it brings some new problems as well.

The scenario I faced was that I wanted to make sure that certain fields did not inherit any value from standard values, default values or via cloning. In my particular case, I wanted to ensure that certain integration settings where defined for each website, even if the sites were cloned. Maybe not a very common requirement, but here’s another example:

Let’s say you have a field that stores a Google Analytics UA code, maybe that code should be defined on each locations where it’s used. Not inherited between sites. (Depending on how you’ve configured GA of course.)

A simple way of solving this is to create a Field Validator that tests this. Here’s some sample code on how to implement such validator:

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public class FieldDoesNotInheritValueValidator : StandardValidator
{
    protected override ValidatorResult Evaluate()
    {
        var field = GetField();
        if (field == null)
            return ValidatorResult.Valid;
 
        // Get field value without resolving fallbacks
        if (field.GetValue(false, false) != null)
            return ValidatorResult.Valid;
 
        Text = GetText("The field \"{0}\" does not contain a value.", GetFieldDisplayName());
        return GetFailedResult(ValidatorResult.Warning);
    }
 
    protected override ValidatorResult GetMaxValidatorResult()
    {
        return ValidatorResult.Warning;
    }
 
    public override string Name
    {
        get { return "Field does not inherit value"; }
    }
}

Just add a new Validation Rule item among the master:/sitecore/system/Settings/Validation Rules/Field Rules and define the class above Your.Namespace.FieldDoesNotInheritValueValidator, Your.Assembly as any other Field validation rule

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