setBlock merge data option

[timothyarmes]

feature

Editor.setBlocks({ data: { ... } -}) replaces the existing data with the new map.

This makes is awkward for plugins to add/remove their own data without affecting other plugins. For example, I have in image plugin that sets the src, and an alignment plugin that sets the block's alignment.

When the alignment plugin tries to add its data using:

Editor.setBlocks({ data: { alignment: 'left' } })

the image src is lost.

[ihd-dev]

You could use existing data when setting the new, so as: Editor.setBlocks({ data: { ...existingData, alignment: 'left' } })

[timothyarmes]

No I can't, that assumes that all the selected blocks have the same data.

Currently I'm doing this:

    editor.withoutNormalizing(() => {
      editor.value.blocks.forEach((block) => {
        editor.setNodeByKey(block.key, { data: block.data.merge(alignmentData).toJS() });
      });
    });

However, it's worth noting that setBlocks ends update doing something more advanced, and doesn't necessarily alter all the blocks:

  // Check if we have a "hanging" selection case where the even though the
  // selection extends into the start of the end node, we actually want to
  // ignore that for UX reasons.
  const isHanging =
    isCollapsed === false &&
    start.offset === 0 &&
    end.offset === 0 &&
    isStartVoid === false &&
    start.key === startBlock.getFirstText().key &&
    end.key === endBlock.getFirstText().key

  // If it's a hanging selection, ignore the last block.
  const sets = isHanging ? blocks.slice(0, -1) : blocks

  editor.withoutNormalizing(() => {
    sets.forEach(block => {
      editor.setNodeByKey(block.key, properties)
    })
  })

It would be nice to have a mergeBlocks function provided.

[ghost]

Hi @timothyarmes,
Slate is in flight on deprecating it's immutable js dependency in favor of immer, so long term this won't be an issue.

However, the first snippet you provided is the way consumers have been advised to handle data; you need to use the editor.setNodeByKey(block.key, { data: block.data.merge(alignmentData) }) form to preserve the existing data.

[ianstormtaylor]

I believe that this may be fixed by #3093, which has changed a lot of the logic in Slate and slate-react especially. I'm going to close this out, but as always, feel free to open a new issue if it persists for you. Thanks for understanding.