Validating a required checkbox

Unfortunately it cannot be required as as you have noted, unchecked means its not present. It also does not make any sense to be required since you know that if it is present then it means true and if it is missing it means false.

No need/point in validating in my book.

No need/point in validating in my book.

This. It can have two states - either it is on (and present) or not.

Yes of course, that's a very valid point. More coffee needed! Thanks.

so you have the column as a boolean in db? I know when I had to deal with a similar issue, I had to write a function that did this:

public function integerCheckBoxes($request)
{
    $request->checkbox = $request->checkbox ? $request->checkbox : 0;
    return $request
}

or in your case

public function booleanCheckBoxes($request)
{
    $request->checkbox = $request->checkbox ? $request->checkbox : false;
    return $request
}

All this does is see if checkbox=1, otherwise, converts , well null into false then returns the request to the calling function

You could put this in your controller, then call it like this

public function someControllerMethod($request)
{
   $request = $this->booleanCheckBoxes($request)

    // your code to put it in db here
}

it all depends on how you setup your column in the DB, I made mine an integer