Claus Ibsen created CAMEL-24692:
-----------------------------------
Summary: camel-catalog: validateLanguagePredicate/Expression for
simple rejects property placeholders used as operands
Key: CAMEL-24692
URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/CAMEL-24692
Project: Camel
Issue Type: Bug
Components: camel-catalog
Reporter: Claus Ibsen
h3. Problem
{{AbstractCamelCatalog.doValidateSimple}} substitutes {{{{X}}}} with {{~^X^~}}
before handing the text to the Simple parser, so placeholders can be parsed
without a running CamelContext. That works when the placeholder sits inside
{{${...}}}, but when a placeholder is a bare operand of a binary operator, or
the whole expression, the parser sees the {{~^}} token and fails. The runtime
resolves property placeholders before parsing Simple, so the same expressions
load and run in a route. The validator therefore rejects valid routes.
h3. Reproducer
camel-catalog 4.23.0-SNAPSHOT, {{CamelCatalog.validateLanguagePredicate(null,
"simple", text)}}:
{code}
ERROR ${body} >= {{hot.threshold}} -> Binary operator >= does not
support token ^ at location 12
OK ${body} >= 30
OK ${body} >= ${properties:hot.threshold}
ERROR ${header.level} == {{level}} -> Binary operator == does not
support token ^ at location 20
ERROR {{hot.threshold}} -> Unexpected token ~ at location 0
{code}
A YAML route with {{when: simple: "${body} >= {{hot.threshold}}"}} and
{{hot.threshold=30}} in application.properties starts with {{camel run}} and
routes correctly.
h3. Impact
The Camel TUI save-time validation ({{SourceEditAssist}}) and the
{{tui_write_file}} / {{tui_validate_source}} MCP tools call this method and
refuse to write a correct file. An AI assistant editing a route was blocked
four times on a correct edit.
h3. Code
{{core/camel-core-catalog/src/main/java/org/apache/camel/catalog/impl/AbstractCamelCatalog.java}},
{{doValidateSimple}}; the {{replaceAll}} to {{~^$1^~}} dates from CAMEL-10959
(2017). The same substitution exists in {{doValidateGroovy}}.
h3. Suggested fix
Substitute placeholders with a token the Simple parser accepts as a literal
operand (a quoted dummy such as {{'placeholder'}}, or a numeric literal when
the operator is numeric), or drop binary-operator operands that are pure
placeholders before parsing, and map error positions back.
Found 2026-09-11 while benchmarking AI-assisted editing in the Camel TUI.
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