I've seen it written elsewhere on SO that while the Enterprise Library Validation Application Block is geared towards validating user inputs, Code Contracts are meant to prevent programmer errors. Would you support this opinion? Why?
+4
A:
Yes.
Code contracts are meant to keep a strict programming interface, which only a developer can get right or wrong; a user shouldn't really be able to mess this up.
Validation is meant to validate the data; e.g. verifying data isn't null, or matches a regex.
notfed
2010-09-01 19:43:42
Yes, a Contracts failure is intended to mean you have a serious bug in your code, that should not be ignored/worked around (this is part of the reason it doesn't throw catchable exceptions by default).
Porges
2010-09-01 21:02:17
+1
A:
Code contracts throw exceptions when they are violated. Invalid user input is not an exceptional condition so validation functions should generally not throw exceptions. That's why methods like TryParse were added to the Framework (the original Framework didn't have them, and it made validation cumbersome because of all the possible exceptions).
Gabe
2010-09-01 19:50:16