Conditional form validation by role

Question

I'm lost on how to do this. I need guest users to have the form fully validated (using the client side validation module) upon creation, but not validating for an authenticated user.

tldr;

The customer (always a guest) will be able to place an order for pickup on a particular date, that date cannot be earlier than 5 days from "today". The customer must always obey the validation rules. Easy, these are set up and working.

When a staff member (always an authenticated user) places a phone order for a customer, they need to be able to override that date, even to one less than 5 days out, skipping the validation.

Similarly, when the staff member edits/updates the webform, they need to be able to do so when it's less than the 5 days. The current client side validation module prohibits anyone from editing the form in less than five days, unless I have the date hidden from them.

I'm struggling to find a process or module that will make this work. Any ideas?

Answer 1

The simplest thing is to apply the validation as you normally would, and then write a hook_form_alter() that does the following:

1. Determine if the current user is logged in, or has a particular role.
2. If logged in, remove the validation pieces from the form render array of that particular field.