rdt-model-validate

Validates all artifacts generated by rdt-model-compile against their JSON Schemas, syntax rules, and contract specifications. This is the pipeline gate — nothing deploys until validation passes.

Property	Value
Binary	rdt-model-validate
Pipeline phase	3 — Prepare
Depends on	rdt-model-compile
Network	None
Credentials	None
Threading	Synchronous — read-only
Exit codes	0 = all checks pass, 1 = runtime error, 2 = validation errors found

Subcommands

Subcommand	Description	Implemented
contract	Validate data contract against JSON Schema	Stub
schema	Ad-hoc JSON Schema validation of any file	Stub
dbt	Validate generated dbt models	Stub
semantic	Validate Semantic YAML	Stub
rules	Validate rule bindings and CEL expressions	Stub
all	Run all checks	Stub

Note

All subcommands are currently stub implementations that print "not yet implemented". The underlying jsonschema crate is already in the workspace dependency tree and the contract schema is embedded — full implementation is tracked in the Phase 1 milestone.

Usage

Validate all artifacts

export RDT_TARGET=dev
rdt-model-validate all --entity waste-tracking

Output (current stub):

[target: dev]
validate all: not yet implemented (entity: waste-tracking)

Validate the data contract

export RDT_TARGET=dev
rdt-model-validate contract --entity waste-tracking

When implemented, this will:

1. Read models/waste-tracking/contract.yaml
2. Validate against cli/compile/src/schemas/contract.schema.json
3. Run datacontract-cli lint on the output (Phase 1+)
4. Exit 0 on success, 2 on any validation error

Validate rules

export RDT_TARGET=dev
rdt-model-validate rules --entity waste-tracking

When implemented, this will:

1. Load rule bindings from models/waste-tracking/rules.yaml
2. Verify all referenced rule IDs exist in rules/library/
3. Compile each CEL expression to validate syntax
4. Report pass/fail per binding

Global flags

Flag	Short	Env	Description
--target	-t	RDT_TARGET	Required. dev, test, or prod
--entity	-e	—	Entity slug (required for all subcommands)
--quiet	-q	—	Suppress informational output
--config	-c	—	Path to roche-data.toml (default: ./roche-data.toml)

Exit codes

Following ADR 0008, the validator uses a fixed exit code convention:

Code	Meaning	When
0	All checks passed	Every check returned passed: true
1	Runtime error	Config load failed, file not found, unexpected error
2	Validation errors	At least one check returned passed: false

CI pipelines should treat exit code 2 as a blocking failure distinct from infrastructure errors (code 1).

# GitHub Actions — example usage
- name: Validate artifacts
  run: rdt-model-validate all --entity waste-tracking --target dev
  # Exit code 2 fails the step and blocks the PR merge gate

What each check validates

contract — data contract schema

Validates models/{entity}/contract.yaml against contract.schema.json.

Key enforced constraints:

• governance.terms_of_use — required, non-empty (added in #84)
• governance.pii — required boolean
• governance.sla_days — required integer ≥ 0
• contract.version — semver format (\d+\.\d+\.\d+)
• contract.gupri_uri — must start with urn:gupri:roche:
• contract.fields — array with at least 1 item; each field requires name, data_type, nullable, primary_key, description

schema — ad-hoc JSON Schema

Validates any JSON/YAML file against any JSON Schema:

rdt-model-validate schema \
  --entity waste-tracking \
  --file models/waste-tracking/contract.yaml \
  --schema cli/compile/src/schemas/contract.schema.json

dbt — dbt model syntax

Validates generated dbt SQL and YAML files for syntax errors before dbt compile is invoked in the deploy step.

semantic — Snowflake Semantic YAML

Validates the Semantic view YAML against the Snowflake Cortex Analyst schema.

rules — DQ rule validation

Validates that rule bindings reference valid rules from the library and that CEL expressions compile successfully. Uses the CEL-based DQ system (ADR 0013).

Rule tiers: Tier 1 (atomic), Tier 2 (lookup), Tier 3 (business)

Pipeline integration

rdt-model-pull pull     →  models/{entity}/model.json
rdt-model-compile contract  →  models/{entity}/contract.yaml
rdt-model-validate all  →  exits 0 (gate passes) or 2 (gate fails)
# deploy steps only run when validate exits 0

In GitHub Actions, the validate step is the merge gate — the deploy workflow only triggers after validate all passes on the PR.

Error handling

validate X: not yet implemented

validate contract: not yet implemented (entity: waste-tracking)

The subcommand is a stub. The binary exits 0 (not 2) so the pipeline is not blocked during the stub phase.

failed to load config

Error: failed to load config: failed to read roche-data.toml

No roche-data.toml in the current directory. Either run from the repo root or pass --config /path/to/roche-data.toml.

RDT_TARGET must be set

Error: RDT_TARGET must be set — use dev, test, or prod

Pass --target dev or set export RDT_TARGET=dev.

Troubleshooting

Validation passes locally but fails in CI

Check that the same RDT_TARGET is used in both environments. Config overrides in [environments.dev.*] differ from [environments.prod.*].

Contract schema validation fails after adding a new field type

The data_type field in contract fields is a free-form string — schema validation does not enforce specific XSD or Snowflake type names. If validation is failing, check that all required field properties (name, data_type, nullable, primary_key, description) are present and non-null.

dbt tests pass but UDF validation fails (or vice versa)

Both dbt tests and Snowflake UDFs are compiled from the same CEL expressions in rules/library/. If they diverge, regenerate both by running:

rdt-model-policy compile --entity <name>

This ensures both targets reflect the current rule library state.