[rules-users] How to validate literal values on the LHS of rules.

Hello all, In my use case, I am planning on using decision tables to implement rules that contain product information (product attributes - like product grade, product style etc). I've managed to put together the spreadsheet and have been successful in generating different set of rules (using rule templates) from this spreadsheet. The spreadsheet with contain basic product information that product fact will be matched against. e.g. The spreadsheet will contain columns of product grade and product styles that when translated into rules, the LHS would look something like Product ( grade == "010", style == "515" ) Where the '010' and '515' would come from a spreadsheet (decision table) that the user's provide. Now here's the challenge. I need to also provide a means for the user to validate the "010" and "515". The available product grade and styles are available in a database table. So I should be able to use that to build second set of rules (templates). So I'm thinking, if there's a way to convert the user supplied spreadsheet and make it a table of 'facts' of the validation rules, I should be able to verify the value "010" "515" against the database. Is that the best way to go about this ? If so, can someone please point me to a way to load facts from a spreadsheet ? I have looked around and found that there is a jxls project that allows loading of JavaBeans from values in spreadsheet. But it requires xml files to be configured. I really like the way rule templates work (by simply state substitution variables in the template itself - thereby avoiding the whole need to configuration xml files). I think if there's a way to load facts using templates from a spreadsheet, I should be able to use that concept to validate the values in my rules. So is it possible to do the above ? Also is there a better way ? Any insight would be appreciated. Thanks in advance, Gurvinder -- View this message in context: http://drools-java-rules-engine.46999.n3.nabble.com/How-to-validate-liter... Sent from the Drools - User mailing list archive at Nabble.com.