Inconsistent rendering of newlines in output metadata

[bkozura]

Dagster version

1.4.16

What's the issue?

When a string or markdown includes a newline character '\n', newlines do not render as expected and are inconsistent between "Run view" and "Materialization view"/"Asset view".

What did you expect to happen?

All new lines should render in output metadata

• in basic strings AND in markdown
• in Run view, Materialization View, AND Asset View

How to reproduce?

metadata = {
    "string_with_single_newline": "The hills are alive with the sound \n of music",
    "string_md_with_single_newline": MetadataValue.md("The hills are alive with the sound \n of music"),
    "string_with_double_newline": "The hills are alive with the sound \n\n of music",
    "string_md_with_double_newline": MetadataValue.md("The hills are alive with the sound \n\n of music"),
}
context.add_output_metadata(metadata=metadata)

Deployment type

Local

Deployment details

No response

Additional information

No response

Message from the maintainers

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[clairelin135]

Thanks @bkozura for reporting -- tagging the UI team for visibility

[tnk-dev]

We experience the same issue, in which we have to resort to a less aesthetic representation in our Asset Event View Plus 1

[cliguda]

A +1 from me as well. SQL statements look very ugly without linebreaks

[bengotow]

Hey gang, thanks for reporting this -- I think the newline behavior may be somewhat expected. In Markdown, a single newline is non-rendering by default (it's just text wrapping you can insert to your liking) and a double newline creates a paragraph break.

I think what you're after may be the \ modifier (https://stackoverflow.com/questions/33191744/how-to-add-new-line-in-markdown-presentation) -- that will tell Markdown that a specific newline is meaningful and you should get two separate lines in Dagster.

(Full disclosure I haven't had a chance to test the \ yet - let me know if that doesn't work!)