[cflsystems]

This is where and way html5 is the way to go but XC is still being released with html4, and QTs modules are html4, full of tables, etc
With html5 you can set the step for the dropdown so there is very little to change in code if it has to be product specific. You can set first option in a dropdown to be "please select" and be mandatory without any coding and without any js code and checking.... There is so much more ....

You can try using the html5 coding for the dropdown although it may not work as expected with the whole page being html5