jQuery - How to dynamically add a validation rule

You need to call .validate() before you can add rules this way, like this:

$("#myForm").validate(); //sets up the validator
$("input[id*=Hours]").rules("add", "required");

The .validate() documentation is a good guide, here's the blurb about .rules("add", option):

Adds the specified rules and returns all rules for the first matched element. Requires that the parent form is validated, that is, $("form").validate() is called first.


To validate all dynamically generated elements could add a special class to each of these elements and use each() function, something like

$("#DivIdContainer .classToValidate").each(function () {
    $(this).rules('add', {
        required: true
    });
});

As well as making sure that you have first called $("#myForm").validate();, make sure that your dynamic control has been added to the DOM before adding the validation rules.


The documentation says:

Adds the specified rules and returns all rules for the first matched element. Requires that the parent form is validated, that is,

> $("form").validate() is called first.

Did you do that? The error message kind of indicates that you didn't.