Changed descriptions are silently overwritten

[chaoflow]

If I edit a description (of an issue in GitLab) which is out-of-date
it will be silently overwritten with my version. The in-browser editor
of GitLab issues a warning in this case.

I think forge should:

• refetch the description right before updating it
• consider my change a patch to the original description to be applied to the now up-to-date description
• display a version with merge headers in case of conflict to be resolved manually

While there is still room for data loss between the refetch and the update, it is a lot less likely than currently.

PS: Thank you very much for this tool! This is my first issues created using it.

[tarsius]

That's quite unfortunate indeed.

refetch the description right before updating it

While that would of course reduce the risk considerably that still wouldn't be 100% safe. This really should be implemented on the server side. (Similar to git update-ref ref new old.)

display a version with merge headers in case of conflict to be resolved manually

Maybe. But as long as the above isn't implemented we don't really need to think about this part.

[chaoflow]

@tarsius This issue prevented me from using forge and I'd like to change that now.

I created an upstream issue to get API support from gitlab https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/issues/465150.

[chaoflow]

@tarsius Meanwhile, I'd like to add a workaround locally so that forge re-fetches the issue right before PUT and aborts and informs me, if the newly fetched description differs from the description it knows about. Any handling of the situation would be manual. An alternative to tracking the description could be the updated_at.

I understand that you don't want such functionality in mainline forge.

Do you have any hints on where and how to add this in forge?

[tarsius]

I'm working on getting a release out. I'll look at this when that is done.

[chaoflow]

I just did a follow-up on the upstream gitlab issue - no proper timestamps yet.

Do you have new thoughts on the workaround?