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Description of problem: Current implementation of dialog builder (Automate/Customization) only allows to select instances through a selector modal window, while there is a _missing_instance attribute in .missing instance that allows to point to methods without having a real instance. It would be interesting to be able to enter a path to an instance that doesn't exist, triggering the .missing / _missing_instance mechanism and thus reducing the number of instances in the automate tree. An awesome implementation would allow raw path in the field and provide an button on the right of the field to open the selector modal window. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): 4.1beta How reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Create a new dialog 2. Add an dynamic element in a box 3. Click on "Entry Point (NS/Cls/Inst)" field Actual results: A modal window opens to select an instance. Expected results: Nothing happens. The user can click on a button that opens the selector. Additional info:
This is a UI change, when we allow the user to pick an instance from the tree as an entry point. If the Automate class has a .missing instance we don't need to have an instance for the entry point, as long as the .missing has the logic to call the correct method we should be good. This allows us to reduce the number of instances in the Automate domain. Maybe the UI should check if there is a .missing and allow the user to enter a valid instance name (no spaces and special characters) into a text box. When displaying the tree would need some kind of a visual cue to let the user know that its a "ghost" instance that doesn't exist but uses the .missing
I was thinking about this when _missing_instance came into play and I guess there could be a scenario where it would show methods just like instances in that tree - in case it would detect that there is a .missing which has a method field with "${#_missing_instance}" exactly in it. That would be a pretty safe indication that someone is using this class as a method storage. I guess those "guesses" would have to be visually marked, something like italic or whatever.
At the moment, the user is responsible for the instance to do something. Maybe a first step would be to leave the user responsible to enter a valid path. The _missing_instance attribute can be used in many ways: trigger a relationship or a method, pass an input to a method... all that up to the user to create a valid structure.
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