Updates to templates on server don't always sync to client extension

[e-t-l]

Description

• Sometimes, after saving changes to a Template on the server (i.e. https://app.briskine.com/template/{template_ID}), the changes to the template are not fully synced to the client-side Briskine extension. I notice this most frequently when I am trying to fix the syntax of some variables in a template. However, it does not occur every time, which makes me suspect that there is a limit to how frequently templates are synced between the server and client.
• Refreshing all tabs and force-syncing template data (using the "sync templates now" 🔁 button on the browser extension's flyout menu) does not solve the problem.
• I say templates are not "fully" synced because, strangely, I notice that the correct template data will appear in the Briskine Dialog (viewed by clicking the Briskine Bubble), yet when inserting a template using either its keyboard shortcut or by clicking it directly in the Briskine Dialog, it still inserts the older, not-up-to-date version of the template.

Steps to reproduce:

1. Open a mail client that has the Briskine extension installed.
2. Edit and save an existing template from the Briskine Dashboard.
3. Refresh the mail client webpage and click the "sync templates now button" on the extension's flyout menu.
4. Insert the template into an email. At this point, it might insert the correct, up-to-date version. If so, continue...
5. On the Briskine Dashboard, make more edits to the template and save it.
6. Again, refresh the mail client webpage and click the "sync templates now button" on the extension flyout. You can even try refreshing the Briskine Dashboard tab and/or fully restarting your web browser.
7. Insert the template into an email. The result should be an older version of your template, not reflecting the most recent changes you had saved.
8. (If it is still inserting the correct, most-recent version of the template, try repeating steps 5-7 a few more times.)
9. (If it still isn't reproducing the bug, try editing a variable syntax error into the template, saving it, then inserting it. Then make another edit that fixes the syntax error, save it, and insert it.*)

*I have a suspicion, although unlikely to be correct, that there is some issue with syncing the templates that occurs only when the handlebarjs syntax in the template is not valid. This may just be because the scenario where I am frequently editing and updating templates is when I'm trying to fix syntax errors, so when the bug occurs for me, it frequently leaves me stuck with a version of my template that produces a syntax error.

... For the record, the template that I originally tried was: Hi {{#if to.0.first_name}}{{capitalizeAll to.0.first_name}}{{#if to.1.first_name}} but that produced the syntax error:

Parse error on line 3:
... cc.0.first_name}}{{capitalizeAll c
-----------------------^
Expecting 'ID', 'STRING', 'NUMBER', 'BOOLEAN', 'UNDEFINED', 'NULL', 'DATA', got 'INVALID'

When I updated the template to just Hi {{#if to.0.first_name}}{{to.0.first_name}}{{#if to.1.first_name}} and saved it, that's when I encountered the bug. Even after refreshing and force-syncing my templates multiple times, it still produces the above error message whenever I try to insert that template.

P.S. Do you know why capitalizeAll doesn't seem to work when used within an #if block? It works fine outside of one.

[ghinda]

Thank you for the detailed report. Unfortunately, I was not able to reproduce the issue. I'll try different scenarios to see if I can reproduce it. If you could isolate the issue further, that would really help.

There shouldn't be any differences when syncing templates with or without syntax errors. The sync itself (or the dashboard for that matter) does not parse or care about the Handlebars syntax. The way it works is:

• When you save a template in the dashboard, and it gets saved in the database, the extension will re-fetch the templates. It does not check the content of the templates (e.g., if there are any syntax errors).
• The dashboard > extension sync events are batched, so it will take at least 1 second for the event to trigger.
• Since we need to wait for the changes to be saved in the database, the sync can take a couple of seconds: T1 (save the template to the database) + T2 (trigger sync, min 1s) + T3 (fetch the templates from the database).
• In addition, if you close the dashboard tab before the sync event is triggered (T1 + T2), the extension will not fetch the new version of the template.

I'm guessing your issue is probably related to this sync time (e.g., updated a template, closed the dashboard tab immediately).

About capitalizeAll: it should work in #if blocks just as well. I've just tested {{#if to.first_name}}{{capitalizeAll to.first_name}}{{/if}} and it seems to be ok.

[e-t-l]

Hmm I left the dashboard tab open and waited more than several seconds after saving the template to re-syncing templates in the extension, so I don't think it's that...

Today it has now successfully synced all the template changes from yesterday, so the issue is gone for now. Also, I noticed a different template had {{#if to.first_name}}{{capitalizeAll to.first_name}}{{/if}} working properly, so I deleted the identical line in the template that was throwing the error and replaced it with the one I copied from the good template. Even though both lines looked truly identical and I couldn't spot any typos, it now parses correctly. No idea what's going on there. I'll close this issue for now and reopen it if I can replicate the problem more reliably or figure out anything further about it.