Property types can be improved

[kevinrr888]

Property types used for properties are often too vague, and could be more specific to allow for stricter property validation. Properties of a certain type are validated by PropertyType.isValidFormat, but, for example, many properties are defined as a PropertyType.STRING which is always valid.

See #5348 (comment) discussion thread for more context

[Amemeda]

Looking into this

[ctubbsii]

While I agree we could do more to improve validation of specific properties, I'd advise that it's still convenient to have a more generic "type" to display to users in the generated documentation. We don't want each property to have its own type, as in "prop1_type", "prop2_type", etc. That's a bit excessive, and makes the types in the documentation meaningless. A property of "STRING" type can still be meaningful, while we do additional validation to make sure that the value of the string is compatible with the property's intended function.

[Amemeda]

While I agree we could do more to improve validation of specific properties, I'd advise that it's still convenient to have a more generic "type" to display to users in the generated documentation. We don't want each property to have its own type, as in "prop1_type", "prop2_type", etc. That's a bit excessive, and makes the types in the documentation meaningless. A property of "STRING" type can still be meaningful, while we do additional validation to make sure that the value of the string is compatible with the property's intended function.

So the PropertyType.STRINGs will remain, but there needs to be additional validation added for them? Also, based off the property type discussion from #5348 , these are the changes Ive identified for this issue, do you have any opinion on them?

• Move the check for required properties out of ServerConfigCheckRunner.java and into Property.java (in pr Improve Property Types #6487 )
• Replace 46 occurrences of PropertyType.STRING with appropriate new/existing PropertyTypes for proper validation
• Add validation for PropertyType.PATH and PropertyType.URI (in pr Improve Property Types #6487 )
• Analyze all properties, determine if they are required, update validation
  - Properties that are not required could accept empty string, null, or a valid value (where validity is well defined)
  - Properties that are required could only accept a valid value