Prevent tools from forgetting the configuration

[haraldharders]

In some cases, the information about incoming columns to tools are (temporarily) forgotten, e.g. if Autoconfig is switched off, if the incoming connection is temporarily missing, or if column names are generated dynamically and the workflow has not been executed, yet.

Many tools deal with that situation well, e.g. Selection, Formula, or Summarize. In these cases, the tools tell the user that they cannot find incoming columns, but they preserve the configuration so that the user still can (at least partially) work on these tools and important information on the configuration is not lost:

Example Select Tool

1. First step: Connections present, configuration typed in:
   
2. Second step: Connection cut, confguration opened. The configuration looks screwed up but implicitly contains all settings:
   
3. Third step: Connection re-connected. The configuration is as before:
   

Other tools behave the opposite, for example Unique or Macro Input (an for sure many other tools). If the incoming columns are currently unknown to the Designer and you click once on the symbol, the entire configuration of this tool is lost. You might try to get the configuration back by pressing undo. This, in most cases does not work. Or, even worse, you find out what happened later when it's too late for undo. In this case, you either have an old version of that workflow to look up the configuration or you have to re-develop it. In any case, this is unnecessary and time-consuming software behaviour.

Example Unique Tool

1. Step 1: Connections present, configuration typed in:
    
2. Step 2: Connection cut, confguration opened. The configuration is empty:
   
3. Step 3: Connection re-connected: The entire configuration is permanently lost:
   

I wasn't sure whether I should report this as a bug or a feature enhancement. It is somehow in between. Two aspects tell me that this should be changed:

• Inconsistent behaviour of different tools for now reason,
• Easy loss of programming work, resulting in time-consuming bug fixing.

Please make sure that all tools preserve their configuration also if information on incoming columns is temporarily lost.

[patrick_digan]

Absolutely agree with you!

[afellows]

Definitely, this is incredibly annoying. 

[Genevieve]

The Unique has the horrible tendency to forget its settings. To bypass that I tend to use a summary and group by all fields. The downside is I don't know which ones are duplicated.

[haraldharders]

@Genevieve, I do the same in case of Unique. Macro Input is at least as bad as Unique in forgetting its settings. For this, there's no workaround. Macro Input even sometimes forgets its configuration without clicking on the symbol...

[Genevieve]

@haraldharders I haven't come across that one yet. But let's vote for it!

[bminuk]

This also happens on the Calgary join tool. Seen on 2024.1.1.49.