[Awaiting checklist completion] [$500] No space after emoji or cursor displayed before emoji on android chrome and ios native

[m-natarajan]

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---

Version Number: 1.3.81-5
Reproducible in staging?: y
Reproducible in production?: y
If this was caught during regression testing, add the test name, ID and link from TestRail:
Email or phone of affected tester (no customers):
Logs: https://stackoverflow.com/c/expensify/questions/4856
Expensify/Expensify Issue URL:
Issue reported by: @dhanashree-sawant
Slack conversation: https://expensify.slack.com/archives/C049HHMV9SM/p1696939352410509

Action Performed:

1. Open the app
2. Open any report
3. Type emoji text in following way ': joy:'
4. Remove space before text to convert it to emoji
5. Observe in android chrome, there is no space after emoji and in IOS native, cursor is displayed before emoji

Expected Result:

App should add space after emoji on converting emoji text to emoji

Actual Result:

App does not display space after emoji on android chrome and displays cursor before emoji on IOS native on converting emoji text to emoji when typed in specific way

Workaround:

Can the user still use Expensify without this being fixed? Have you informed them of the workaround?

Platforms:

Which of our officially supported platforms is this issue occurring on?

• Android: Native
• Android: mWeb Chrome
• iOS: Native
• iOS: mWeb Safari
• MacOS: Chrome / Safari
• MacOS: Desktop

Screenshots/Videos

Android: Native

Android: mWeb Chrome

az_recorder_20231011_202142.1.mp4

android.chrome.space.after.emoji.issue.mp4

iOS: Native

ios.native.space.after.emoji.issue.mov

iOS: mWeb Safari

MacOS: Chrome / Safari

MacOS: Desktop

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Upwork Automation - Do Not Edit

• Upwork Job URL: https://www.upwork.com/jobs/~0164d5ee2c19ee0a5a
• Upwork Job ID: 1712265898986901504
• Last Price Increase: 2023-10-26
• Automatic offers:
• aimane-chnaif | Reviewer | 27494949
• dhanashree-sawant | Reporter | 27494950

Issue Owner

Current Issue Owner: @aimane-chnaif

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to @twisterdotcom (Bug), see https://stackoverflow.com/c/expensify/questions/14418 for more details.

[melvin-bot]

Job added to Upwork: https://www.upwork.com/jobs/~0164d5ee2c19ee0a5a

[melvin-bot]

Bug0 Triage Checklist (Main S/O)

• This "bug" occurs on a supported platform (ensure Platforms in OP are ✅)
• This bug is not a duplicate report (check E/App issues and #expensify-bugs)
  • If it is, comment with a link to the original report, close the issue and add any novel details to the original issue instead
• This bug is reproducible using the reproduction steps in the OP. S/O
  • If the reproduction steps are clear and you're unable to reproduce the bug, check with the reporter and QA first, then close the issue.
  • If the reproduction steps aren't clear and you determine the correct steps, please update the OP.
• This issue is filled out as thoroughly and clearly as possible
  • Pay special attention to the title, results, platforms where the bug occurs, and if the bug happens on staging/production.
• I have reviewed and subscribed to the linked Slack conversation to ensure Slack/Github stay in sync

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to Contributor-plus team member for initial proposal review - @aimane-chnaif (External)

[roksanaz]

I investigated this issue and I couldn't reproduce it on Android (the space appeared after the emoji on mobile website on Chrome).
As for iOS, I tested other chat apps to search if this is the issue with Expensify app only or rather with iOS, e.g. Slack, and if you type ': joy:' and remove the space between the colon and "j" afterwards, the emoji isn't even converted. Should this issue be treated as a bug or not then?

[melvin-bot]

📣 @roksanaz! 📣
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[twisterdotcom]

It does work on the iOS app and on web, just not the Android app.

And for Slack, they do render it after you remove the space:

29405.mp4

[roksanaz]

@twisterdotcom About iOS: in Expensify the emoji appears immediately after you remove the space (meaning your cursor is after the first colon symbol), while on Slack you need to manually set the cursor after the second colon symbol. That is why the cursor is in the correct position on Slack and on Expensify it's not.

[melvin-bot]

📣 It's been a week! Do we have any satisfactory proposals yet? Do we need to adjust the bounty for this issue? 💸

[twisterdotcom]

Okay cool, so the expected behaviour everywhere is the current web behaviour:

I see this does now work on Android, but on iOS the cursor remains at the back of the text, ahead of it.

[roksanaz]

I am Roksana from Callstack - expert contributor group. I’d like to work on this job.

[melvin-bot]

@twisterdotcom, @aimane-chnaif Whoops! This issue is 2 days overdue. Let's get this updated quick!

[twisterdotcom]

@aimane-chnaif - could we please just assign @roksanaz here?

[aimane-chnaif]

yes, but still @roksanaz needs to submit proposal before PR

[roksanaz]

Proposal

Please re-state the problem that we are trying to solve in this issue.

In the native iOS application if the user types the emoji manually, but they unintentionally put a space after the first colon mark (e.g. “: joy:”) and then remove the space, the emoji is converted successfully, but the cursor goes before the emoji instead of after the emoji.

What is the root cause of that problem?

There is a method for setting the cursor position programatically:

App/src/pages/home/report/ReportActionCompose/ComposerWithSuggestions.js

Lines 230 to 235 in e968637

	if (commentValue !== newComment) {
	const remainder = ComposerUtils.getCommonSuffixLength(commentValue, newComment);
	setSelection({
	start: newComment.length - remainder,
	end: newComment.length - remainder,
	});

But selection parameter (which indicates the cursor position) is not passed for native iOS platform, because setting selection used to be unstable for iOS in previous versions of React Native (facebook/react-native#29063).

What changes do you think we should make in order to solve the problem?

selection parameter is not unstable in the version of React Native that is used in the app if implemented correctly (facebook/react-native#29063 (comment)). The implementation used for Expensify is similar to the one quoted. Therefore I suggest to stop omitting this parameter for iOS. We should pass the same props as for Android and web, without omitting the selection prop that is happening here:

App/src/components/Composer/index.ios.js

Lines 112 to 113 in eee46dc

	// On Android the selection prop is required on the TextInput but this prop has issues on IOS
	const propsToPass = _.omit(props, 'selection');

[melvin-bot]

@twisterdotcom @aimane-chnaif this issue was created 2 weeks ago. Are we close to approving a proposal? If not, what's blocking us from getting this issue assigned? Don't hesitate to create a thread in #expensify-open-source to align faster in real time. Thanks!

[twisterdotcom]

Ah, missed your comment! Sorry @artus9033. You're assigned now. Thanks!

[aimane-chnaif]

@artus9033 how's it going?

[artus9033]

@artus9033 how's it going?

Still working on fix update due to the unfavorable behaviour of RN's TextInput on iOS, which fires a series of onSelectionChange events after inserting an emoji that causes problems. I am close to the perfect solution and will submit new commits soon.

[artus9033]

Proposal

Please re-state the problem that we are trying to solve in this issue.

In the native iOS application if the user types the emoji manually, but they unintentionally put a space after the first colon mark (e.g. “: joy:”) and then remove the space, the emoji is converted successfully, but the cursor goes before the emoji instead of after the emoji.

This is an updated approach with regards to #30835 (comment)

What is the root cause of that problem?

There is a way to set the cursor position programatically through a prop passed to TextInput, but the selection parameter (which indicates the cursor position) is not passed for native iOS platform, because setting selection used to be unstable for iOS in previous versions of React Native (facebook/react-native#29063) and causes problems.

The previous proposal involved a momentary behaviour of the cursor jumping to {0, 0}, since it was delaying setting the cursor position to the pre-calculated one. I attempted to overcome this caret behaviour, however on iOS native the original passing of the selection on iOS caused onSelectionChange to be fired sequentially when replacing emoji markers, resulting in unfavorable behaviour of the cursor "jumping around" for a brief moment before being positioned properly by the fix.

What changes do you think we should make in order to solve the problem?

A solution would be to set a flag to sync cursor position inside onChangeText on iOS specifically by setting it via TextInput ref after all interactions finish, to the position pre-calculated in onSelectionChange.

[aimane-chnaif]

@youssef-lr since original proposal didn't work on this case, @artus9033 updated proposal with completely different solution.

[melvin-bot]

@twisterdotcom, @youssef-lr, @artus9033, @aimane-chnaif Uh oh! This issue is overdue by 2 days. Don't forget to update your issues!

[melvin-bot]

@twisterdotcom, @youssef-lr, @artus9033, @aimane-chnaif Still overdue 6 days?! Let's take care of this!

[melvin-bot]

@twisterdotcom, @youssef-lr, @artus9033, @aimane-chnaif 8 days overdue is a lot. Should this be a Weekly issue? If so, feel free to change it!

[melvin-bot]

@twisterdotcom, @youssef-lr, @artus9033, @aimane-chnaif 10 days overdue. I'm getting more depressed than Marvin.

[mountiny]

@kavimuru Based on the comment here this issue was not resolve on ios native @roksanaz @aimane-chnaif

Could you provide more details on this one/ verify this is still not fixed in staging?

[aimane-chnaif]

I am not able to reproduce.
@kavimuru can you please share video?

[kavimuru]

@mountiny @aimane-chnaif this is the video https://platform.applause.com/services/links/v1/external/18b2ae2543684c6e0f912e822e9e4efa99d2c6e98489a2e6f806358a726a6dce

[melvin-bot]

Reviewing label has been removed, please complete the "BugZero Checklist".

[melvin-bot]

The solution for this issue has been 🚀 deployed to production 🚀 in version 1.4.19-2 and is now subject to a 7-day regression period 📆. Here is the list of pull requests that resolve this issue:

• Fix 29405 cursor displayed before emoji on ios native #30835

If no regressions arise, payment will be issued on 2024-01-05. 🎊

After the hold period is over and BZ checklist items are completed, please complete any of the applicable payments for this issue, and check them off once done.

• External issue reporter
• Contributor that fixed the issue
• Contributor+ that helped on the issue and/or PR

For reference, here are some details about the assignees on this issue:

• @artus9033 requires payment (Needs manual offer from BZ)
• @aimane-chnaif requires payment automatic offer (Reviewer)
• @dhanashree-sawant requires payment automatic offer (Reporter)

[melvin-bot]

BugZero Checklist: The PR fixing this issue has been merged! The following checklist (instructions) will need to be completed before the issue can be closed:

• [@aimane-chnaif] The PR that introduced the bug has been identified. Link to the PR:
• [@aimane-chnaif] The offending PR has been commented on, pointing out the bug it caused and why, so the author and reviewers can learn from the mistake. Link to comment:
• [@aimane-chnaif] A discussion in #expensify-bugs has been started about whether any other steps should be taken (e.g. updating the PR review checklist) in order to catch this type of bug sooner. Link to discussion:
• [@aimane-chnaif] Determine if we should create a regression test for this bug.
• [@aimane-chnaif] If we decide to create a regression test for the bug, please propose the regression test steps to ensure the same bug will not reach production again.
• [@twisterdotcom] Link the GH issue for creating/updating the regression test once above steps have been agreed upon:

[twisterdotcom]

Wow, this is an old one! Okay. Payment Summary:

• @artus9033 is from Callstack, no individual payment required.
• @aimane-chnaif paid $500 here (Reviewer)
• @dhanashree-sawant paid $50 here (Reporter)

Awaiting checklist completion by @aimane-chnaif.

[aimane-chnaif]

Not able to find offending PR. As the root cause was in upstream, I think this bug always existed from the beginning.

Regression Test Proposal

1. Open any report and focus on composer
2. Type emoji text in the following way ': joy:'
3. Remove space before joy to convert it to emoji
4. Verify that cursor is displayed after emoji