Can't open control settings after editing control prefix

[ebruchez]

• insert Number
• Control Settings
• update prefix
• apply settings
• try Control Settings again
• dialog doesn't open

What happens after adding the prefix is that the control changes its id. For example in my case it coes from control-3-control to xf-311. When you try to open the the Control Settings again, Form Builder passes xf-311 and the server can't find that control in the form definition.

[ebruchez]

This is because we remove the id attribute. Regressed with #1433 in a0176d4.

[ebruchez]

• don't remove the id attribute
• more to fix as Control Settings doesn't read things like prefix anymore either

[ebruchez]

The way things work since that commit is that we delete attributes which don't exist on the view template in the XBL component. fr:number doesn't have for example prefix in that template.

So the question is whether we are happy with that and need to add all the attribute on the template. The drawback is that we get extra attributes in the form. Some might be not desirable, like grouping-separator, which I think have a different meaning when empty.

I am just wondering why we are deleting these attributes. To discuss with @avernet.

[ebruchez]

Following discussion with @avernet:

This was done so that when you change a control's appearance, you don't keep extra attributes which might be relevant to the older appearance. So a list of relevant attributes for an appearance is required.

Now, specifically, fr:number only has a single appearance. Could we make it so that in such cases we don't prune attributes? Or do this only when we prune appearances?

[ebruchez]

What #1433 did when inserting the control to the dynamic editor is twofold:

• add attributes that are in the view template but not in the control (with the same value as on the template)
• remove attributes that are in the control but not in the template

It does this in fb-process-xbl-fb-control-details:

• when the dialog loads
• when the dialog moves from control to control (prev/next)
• when the value of the appearance changes in the dialog

[ebruchez]

Implicit notions:

• supported attributes
• required attributes

Right now, after #1433, the code assumes that all supported and required attributes are on the view template. fr:number assumes it does all the work on its own.

[ebruchez]

So what should happen if you have fr:my-foo and fr:my-bar which represent two appearances foo and bar of fr:my. But for some reason, fr:my-foo and fr:my-bar support different attribute sets.

I understand that we should probably prune unsupported attributes.

However, I am not sure we should add all missing attributes. It would be better for the editor to figure that out. Unless we have another notion of the attributes being required.

In short this is a bit of a headache.

[ebruchez]

As an immediate fix, what if we only add/remove the attributes when there is an appearance change?