Data Constraints, Features, and Validations

Constraints

The following constraints may be applied to attributes of the string data type using the /entityType.setAttributeConstraints API.

Constraint	Description
alphabetic	Data may only contain characters A–Z.
alphanumeric	Data may contain characters A–Z and 0–9.
unicode-letters	Data may only contain characters encoded using the Unicode standard.
unicode-printable	Data may only contain Unicode-encoded characters that can be printed to the screen in HTML. The excluded characters are: u0000–u001F, u007F–u009F, \n, \t, and \r. Note that the unicode-printable constraint only works with characters released as part of Unicode 7.0 or earlier; see this article for more information.
email-address	Data must contain an @ symbol and top level domain suffix, such as .com.
length	Used only with attributes of type string. Defines the number of characters allowed. By default, string length must be specified for the attribute to be indexed.
required	Data must contain a non-null value.
unique	Data must be globally unique across all entities in an entityType.
locally-unique	Data must be locally unique across plurals within a single entity.

When added to an attribute, constraints are applied only to data saved to user records after the constraint is applied. The exceptions to this rule are the unique and locally-unique constraints, which apply retroactively to data already collected. If existing data violates the constraint, adding the rule will result in an error. Error responses are explained in detail in the Error Codes topic.

Constraints set on a schema attribute will apply globally to all records. If you need to apply different constraints or validations on data collected at different sites or properties, the Configuration API will allow you to apply those in the flow configuration layer.

Features

The following features may be applied to attributes of the string data type. These features may only be applied by the Akamai team.

Feature	Description
primary-key	Makes the attribute a primary key for the plural or entity type it exists in, providing the ability to target a specific record in a plural in API calls without knowing the actual identifier for that record. Requires both required and either unique or locally-unique constraints.
query	Adds an index to an attribute to optimize the performance of entity.find API calls.

Data Validation Rules

The following data validation rules may be applied to attributes using the entityType.addRule API. The table below notes which attribute type each rule may be applied to and what type of argument each rule will accept, if any. Filters that transform input are applied before filters that validate input.

Important. Regular expressions work only when used with single-byte characters. At this point in time, regular expressions cannot be used with Unicode characters.

Rule	Description	Transforms Input?	Attribute Type	Argument Type
match	Data must contain a match from a POSIX-style regular expression.	no	string	string
match-all	Data must completely match a POSIX-style regular expression.	no	string	string
min-length	Data must be less than or equal to the argument supplied.	no	string	integer
max-length	Data must be greater than or equal to the argument supplied.	no	string	integer
less-than	Data must be less than the argument supplied.	no	integer	number
greater-than	Data must be greater than the argument supplied.	no	integer	number
required	Data must contain a non-null value.	no	any	none
min-age	The date submitted must be at least n years ago.	no	date	integer
default	Data will be pre-populated with the argument supplied.	yes	any	integer or string
ignore-update		yes	any	none
truncate	Stores only the first n characters of the value submitted.	yes	string	integer
to-lower	Converts a string value to lower case.	yes	string	none
to-upper	Converts a string value to upper case.	yes	string	none
and	Combines a list of filters and fails if one of the filters fails.	maybe	array of rules	array of strings and/or objects
or	Combines a list of filters and fails if all of the filters failed.	maybe	array of rules	array of strings and/or objects
not	Turns a failed filter result into a successful filter result.	maybe	rule	string or object

When added to an attribute, rules are applied only to data saved to user records after the rules are applied. When a rule is violated, a 360 (constraint_violation) error is returned. Error responses are explained in detail in the Error Codes topic.

Rules set on a schema attribute will apply globally to all records. If you need to apply different constraints or validations on data collected at different sites or properties, the Configuration API will allow you to apply those in the flow configuration layer.

Rule Definition Examples

Values are truncated to 100 characters if their length is over 100 and converted to lower case:


{
 "and": [
 {"truncate": 100}
 ,"to-lower"
 ]
 }

Values are rejected if they are less than six characters long or contain any 3s or fs:


 {
      "and": [
          {"min-length": 6},
          {"not": {
                "match":"[3f]"
            }
          }
      ]
    }

Sets a minimum age of 16:


    {
       "and":[
          {
             "min-age":16
          },
          "required"
       ]
    }

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