You may use constraints grouping and group sequences to define the validation order. According to JSR-303 (part 3.5. Validation routine):
Unless ordered by group sequences, groups can be validated in no
particular order. This implies that the validation routine can be run
for several groups in the same pass.
As Hibernate Validator documentation says:
In order to implement such a validation order you just need to define
an interface and annotate it with @GroupSequence, defining the order
in which the groups have to be validated (see Defining a group
sequence). If at least one constraint fails in a sequenced group, none
of the constraints of the following groups in the sequence get
validated.
First, you have to define constraint groups and apply them to the constraints:
public interface CheckItFirst {}
public interface ThenCheckIt {}
public class FormModel {
@NotBlank
private String name;
@NotNull(groups = CheckItFirst.class)
@ImageSizeConstraint(groups = ThenCheckIt.class)
private MultipartFile image;
}
And then, as constraints are evaluated in no particular order, regardless of which groups they belong to (Default group too), you have to create @GroupSequence for your image field constraints groups.
@GroupSequence({ CheckItFirst.class, ThenCheckIt.class })
public interface OrderedChecks {}
You can test it with
Validator validator = Validation.buildDefaultValidatorFactory().getValidator();
Set<ConstraintViolation<FormModel>> constraintViolations =
validator.validate(formModel, OrderedChecks.class);
To apply this validation in Spring MVC Controller methods, you may use the @Validated annotation, which can specify the validation groups for method-level validation:
@PostMapping(value = "/processFormModel")
public String processFormModel(@Validated(OrderedChecks.class) FormModel formModel) {
<...>
}
