Document API Request Bodies with Laravel Form Requests

Geni automatically documents your request bodies by statically analyzing validation rules — no docblock comments, no annotations, no manual schema writing. Wherever you define validation in your Laravel application, Geni reads those rules at parse time and converts them into accurate OpenAPI request body schemas.

Supported Validation Sources

Geni inspects three distinct sources of validation rules in your controller actions.

Dedicated Form Requests

When a controller action type-hints a class that extends Illuminate\Foundation\Http\FormRequest, Geni resolves that class and parses the array returned by its rules() method:

public function store(StoreArticleRequest $request)
{
    // ...
}

class StoreArticleRequest extends FormRequest
{
    public function rules(): array
    {
        return [
            'title'       => ['required', 'string', 'max:120'],
            'body'        => ['required', 'string'],
            'status'      => ['nullable', Rule::in(['draft', 'published', 'archived'])],
            'tags'        => ['array'],
            'tags.*'      => ['integer', 'exists:tags,id'],
            'cover_image' => ['nullable', 'image', 'max:2048'],
        ];
    }
}

Inline `$request->validate()`

When validation is performed directly inside the controller method, Geni parses the rules array passed to validate():

public function store(Request $request)
{
    $validated = $request->validate([
        'title'       => 'required|string|max:120',
        'category_id' => 'required|integer',
    ]);
}

`Validator::make()`

When you use the Validator facade or helper, Geni reads the rules passed as the second argument:

public function update(Request $request, Post $post)
{
    $validator = Validator::make($request->all(), [
        'title' => 'required|string',
    ]);
}

Validation Rule Mapping

Geni maps Laravel validation rules to their OpenAPI JSON Schema equivalents:

Laravel Rule	OpenAPI JSON Schema Property
`required`	Added to schema `required` array
`nullable`	Omitted from `required`; supports `type: [type, "null"]`
`string`, `alpha`, `alpha_dash`	`type: "string"`
`integer`, `numeric`, `digits`	`type: "integer"` or `type: "number"`
`boolean`	`type: "boolean"`
`array`	`type: "array"`
`date`, `date_format:Y-m-d`	`type: "string"`, `format: "date"`
`date_format:Y-m-d H:i:s`	`type: "string"`, `format: "date-time"`
`email`	`type: "string"`, `format: "email"`
`url`, `active_url`	`type: "string"`, `format: "uri"`
`uuid`	`type: "string"`, `format: "uuid"`
`min:val`	`minLength: val` (string) or `minimum: val` (numeric)
`max:val`	`maxLength: val` (string) or `maximum: val` (numeric)
`between:min,max`	`minLength` / `maxLength` or `minimum` / `maximum`
`in:a,b,c` / `Rule::in(...)`	`enum: ["a", "b", "c"]`
`file`, `image`, `mimes:...`	`format: "binary"`; switches request to `multipart/form-data`
`confirmed`	Automatically generates sibling `{field}_confirmation` property

Multipart Form Data

When Geni detects a file, image, or mimes rule on any field in a request, it automatically switches the request body media type from application/json to multipart/form-data. No additional configuration is required. For example, because cover_image carries the image rule in StoreArticleRequest, Geni documents the entire request body as multipart/form-data and marks cover_image with format: "binary":

'cover_image' => ['nullable', 'image', 'max:2048'],

The resulting OpenAPI schema for cover_image becomes:

"cover_image": {
  "type": "string",
  "format": "binary",
  "nullable": true
}

Use dedicated Form Request classes (extending FormRequest) as your preferred validation pattern. They give Geni the clearest static signal, keep your controller methods lean, and produce the most accurate OpenAPI schemas.

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Document API Request Bodies with Laravel Form Requests

Supported Validation Sources

Dedicated Form Requests

Inline `$request->validate()`

`Validator::make()`

Validation Rule Mapping

Multipart Form Data

​Supported Validation Sources

​Dedicated Form Requests

​Inline $request->validate()

​Validator::make()

​Validation Rule Mapping

​Multipart Form Data

Supported Validation Sources

Dedicated Form Requests

Inline `$request->validate()`

`Validator::make()`

Validation Rule Mapping

Multipart Form Data