ng-model is not updated immediately in Chrome WebView or Browser

[davgothic]

On Android 4.4 (KitKat) using both the Chrome WebView (v30) and the Chrome Browser (v31.0.1650.59) an input with an ng-model is not updating the variable value until the focus leaves the input.

The following commit for version 1.2.2 is responsible for this bug:

• input: hold listener during text composition (a4e6d96, handle composition events in NgModelController textInputType #4684)

If I revert that commit in angular 1.2.3 or revert to angular 1.2.1 the problem goes away.

Here is a demo of the problem:
http://plnkr.co/edit/ZcksakM9icREgxe38Pnf?p=preview

[caitp]

Do you think this is related to #5298 @davgothic? It doesn't look like it should be as it's not preventing default, but even so it's something to look at I guess (it's possible the browser compositionstarts regardless of IME) --- Yeah, it shouldn't matter WRT the other issue, but it's still interesting.

[davgothic]

@caitp I did at first think this issue was related to #5298 but I rolled back angular to 1.2.0 (before the offending commit) and this issue is fixed but the other one is not.

[caitp]

Yeah, they are separate issues certainly (which is too bad, it would be easier to fix just one!)

Do you have any idea how we can get around this for languages/IMEs that don’t really “need” composition events? It seems like not a good idea

Caitlin Potter
snowball@defpixel.com

On Dec 6, 2013, at 10:17 AM, David Hancock notifications@github.com wrote:

@caitp I did at first think this issue was related to #5298 but I rolled back angular to 1.2.0 (before the offending commit) and this issue is fixed but the other one is not.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub.

[caitp]

So, I'm not sure there is anything we can do about this :( Based on https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=118639, it looks like we're pretty much at the mercy of what a given IME decides to tell us, and have no ability to detect a specific IME and change our behaviour in response.

I'm not sure what the right approach is, is an app usable at all on Android with this issue? Like, do you see the model updated just late? It might be the most sensible approach to just hope that IME vendors fix their bugs, rather than choosing to break apps which make use of them totally.

[tbosch]

Quick update: I tried to reproduce this with Android Emulator and Chrome Shell, but it worked well.
My Nexus 5 should arrive in two days, so I can test it there.

Sorry, but this won't make it into the release today, but hopefully into the release next week.

[fabiobiondi]

I confirm the same problem (Samsung S4 / Chrome / Android 4.2.2):
"an input with an ng-model is not updating the variable value until the focus leaves the input."

Angular 1.2.3 has the problem
Angular 1.2.1 is ok

[caitp]

We know the cause, it's because we're not updating the model until we get compositionend, and android IMEs unfortunately don't do the best job of emiting this at a right/appropriate time. The question is, is it fair to rollback the change for that and potentially upset people who require CJK IMEs or arabic or something, or not?

Like, that's kind of a hard call to make, it seems like this should probably be dealt with elsewhere (eg in Android / 3rd party IMEs). I'm not totally convinced it makes sense to roll back.

What else can we do.. Set a timeout after the compositionstart or something? That's just going to introduce flakiness and that's no good.

If you have any ideas of how to deal with this from within angular in a fair and balanced way, I'd love to hear it. But I'm not so sure such a way exists

[fabiobiondi]

Hi caipt...
thank you for your support.

I think it's very important find a way to fix it because now it's impossible update stuff while using an Android mobile keyboard and it'is unacceptable :(
For example, now I'm developing a auto-complete component and as you can imagine I need the model is updated (and it's not until i close the keyboard or click on the "confirm" button).

If you don't want to remove the feature might you give us a little patch that we can include in our projects?

Thanks in advance

[caitp]

I've personally been experiencing this behaviour on web apps (which aren't angular-based, such as github) on my android phone for ages now, and this is actually the closest I've come to really explaining why it happens! kind of funny.

I don't know, I don't like the idea of hurting people with CJK requirements or anything, but I agree that it's not really a good thing. It's just that there probably isn't much we can do about it from within Angular while still supporting complex IMEs

[tbosch]

Hi @clkao,
could you verify that this is working as expected?