Apex.RuleGrid

FREE Excel-based minimal and simple rule-engine that can be integrated into any application.

Overview

The RuleGrid project is a .NET 8 Excel-Based application designed to manage and apply business rules stored in MongoDB. It provides functionality to upload rule sets from Excel files, convert them to JSON, and store them in a MongoDB database. Additionally, it allows applying these rules to a set of objects.

Features

• Upload rule sets from Excel files.
• Convert Excel data to JSON format.
• Store and retrieve rule sets from MongoDB.
• Apply rules to objects based on specified conditions and actions.

Technologies Used

• .NET 8
• C# 12.0
• ASP.NET Core
• MongoDB
• ClosedXML (for Excel file handling)
• Swashbuckle (for API documentation)

Project Structure

Controllers

• RuleGridController.cs: Handles the uploading of rule sets and applying rules to objects.

Services

• MongoDbService.cs: Provides methods to interact with MongoDB, including saving and retrieving rule sets.
• RuleEngineService.cs: This is the core service of rule processor and applies rules to objects.

Models

• RuleSetDbModel.cs: Represents the rule set stored in MongoDB.
• Rule.cs: Represents an individual rule with conditions and actions.
• MetaData.cs: Represents metadata associated with a rule set.
• RuleApplicationRequest.cs: Represents the request model for applying rules.

Getting Started

Prerequisites

• .NET 8 SDK
• MongoDB instance
• Visual Studio 2022

Configuration

1. MongoDB Configuration: Update the appsettings.json file with your MongoDB connection string and database name.

   {
       "MongoDB": {
           "ConnectionString": "your-mongodb-connection-string",
           "DatabaseName": "your-database-name"
       }
   }

Excel File Format

• The Excel file should contain two sheets: Metadata and Rules.
• The Metadata sheet should contain the following columns: Id, Name, ClassName, GeneralAction, ConditionsOperator, Priority.
• The Rules sheet should contain the following columns: Index, Condition_X, Action_X.
• The X in Condition_X and Action_X represents the index of the condition or action.
• The ConditionsOperator column in the Metadata sheet should contain one of the following values: AND, OR.
• The Priority column in the Metadata sheet should contain an integer value.
• The GeneralAction column in the Metadata sheet can contain one of the following values: SetAppliedRules.
• The Index column in the Rules sheet should contain an integer value or #FieldName/#Operator for first two rows.
• The Condition_X column in the Rules sheet should contain the condition expression.
• The Action_X column in the Rules sheet should contain the action expression.
• The ClassName column in the Metadata sheet should contain the class name to which the rules will be applied.
• The Name column in the Metadata sheet should contain the name of the rule set.
• The Id column in the Metadata sheet should contain a unique identifier for the rule set.
• Conditions and actions can be one or more columns in the Rules sheet.
• The ConditionsOperator column in the Metadata sheet should contain the operator to be used for combining conditions.
• The Priority column in the Metadata sheet should contain the priority of the rule set.
• Conditions operator can be Equals, GreaterThan, LowerThan.
• Actions operator can be Set, Increase, Decrease.

Sheet one (Metadata):

Sheet two (Rules):

Running the Application

1. Open the solution in Visual Studio 2022.
2. Build the solution to restore the dependencies.
3. Run the application.

API Endpoints

Upload Rule Set

• Endpoint: POST /api/v1/RuleEngine/upload-ruleset
• Description: Uploads an Excel file containing rule sets.
• Request: multipart/form-data with one or more files.

Apply Rules

• Endpoint: POST /api/v1/RuleEngine/apply-rules

• Description: Applies rules to a set of objects.

• Request: JSON body containing ClassName and Objects.

  {
    "ClassName": "example-class",
    "Objects": [
          {
            "property1": "value1",
            "property2": "value2"
          }
    ]
  }

Workflow Diagram

graph TD
    A[Client Request] -->|Upload Rule Set| B[RuleGridController]
    B -->|Extract Data from Excel| C[ClosedXML]
    C -->|Convert to JSON| D[RuleSetDbModel]
    D -->|Store in MongoDB| E[MongoDbService]
    A -->|Apply Rules| B
    B -->|Fetch Rules from MongoDB| E
    E -->|Apply Conditions and Actions| F[Rule Processor]
    F -->|Return Modified Objects| G[Client Response]

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Example Usage

Uploading a Rule Set

1. Use a tool like Postman to send a POST request to /api/v1/RuleEngine/upload-ruleset.
2. Attach the Excel file(s) containing the rule sets.

Applying Rules

1. Use a tool like Postman to send a POST request to /api/v1/RuleEngine/apply-rules.
2. Provide the ClassName and Objects in the request body.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please open an issue or submit a pull request for any improvements or bug fixes.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.

Contact

For any questions or support, please contact the project maintainers.

@miladashrafi

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This README file provides a comprehensive overview of the RuleGrid project, including its features, technologies used, project structure, and instructions for getting started.