There are three core concepts when it comes to vacuum.
- Function
- Rule
- RuleSet
What are Rules?
Rules are filters that define a set of target values you want to check against. Rules define what to look up, where to find it and what to check for. Those options are then sent to a function that will execute that logic.
Rules enforce a company or product API style guide.
There are built-in rules which can be used out of the box, custom rules can easily be added.
Rules are made up of (they can call) multiple functions.
What are Functions?
Functions are blocks of golang business logic that perform a certain validation on an OpenAPI specification. They iterate through different nodes, or perform a lookup for a specific item, and perform the actual validation.
There are a collection of simple built-in core functions that can be used to create any number of custom rules, without writing any code.
There are also a number of built-in OpenAPI functions available that already perform a ton of custom validation.
Functions can serve multiple rules.
What are RuleSets?
A RuleSet a collection of rules to be used when linting a specification. RuleSets allow you to create different types of validations for different specifications. Depending on need.
RuleSets can override the built-in RuleSets with different severity levels or function options.
RuleSets are what vacuum uses to know what to look for when linting an OpenAPI specification.