Question

Is there possibility to add rules by wildcard? I think it’s not possible to set rules like this…

$("#form").validate({
        // errorLabelContainer: $("div#error"),
        errorElement: "p",
        errorClass: "form-error",
        rules: {
             $("input[name*='x.child']"): {
                required: true,
                minlength: 5
            }
        }
});

Answer 1

Use the built-in rules() method to add rules. See documentation.

Note: You must call this method after you call .validate().

jsFiddle DEMO

$("#form").validate({
    errorElement: "p",
    errorClass: "form-error"
});

// the following method must come AFTER .validate()
$("input[name*='x.child']").each(function() {
    $(this).rules('add', {
        required: true,
        minlength: 5
    });
});

This method can also be very useful when you are dynamically adding fields to your form.

The following to combine with custom messages:. Note that the format is slightly different than when adding rules as options within .validate()…

$("input[name*='x.child']").each(function() {
    $(this).rules('add', {
        required: true,
        minlength: 5,
        messages: {
            required: "Required input",
            minlength: jQuery.format("At least {0} characters are necessary")
        }
    });
});

---

As mentioned elsewhere, you can also create a class and use like this…

jsFiddle DEMO

HTML:

<input type="text" class="myclass" name="whatever" />

jQuery:

$("#form").validate({
    errorElement: "p",
    errorClass: "form-error"
});

// the following method must come AFTER .validate()
$('#form').find('.myclass').each(function() {
    $(this).rules('add', {
        required: true,
        minlength: 5,
        messages: {
            required: "Required input",
            minlength: jQuery.format("At least {0} characters are necessary")
        }
    });
});