DigestRegularMetadata.BackoffUnit is serialized incorrectly when not set.

[lukeskrzypek-sf]

When creating a workflow that contains a Digest step, the DigestRegularMetadata doesn't seem to be serialized correctly if BackoffUnit is not set. In that case, it is serialized as 0 which is not one of the valid string values. The call to create the workflow succeeds, but the web page shows an error on the created Digest step.

Seems like the optional fields on the model should be nullable, so that they aren't serialized when not set.

var digestStep = new Models.Workflows.Step.Step
{
    Template = new DigestMessageTemplate(),
    Metadata = new DigestRegularMetadata()
    {
        Unit = UnitEnum.Minutes,
        Amount = 5
     }
}

...
"metadata": {
    "type": "regular",
    "backoff": false,
    "backoffAmount": 0,
    "backoffUnit": 0, // <-- incorrect
    "updateMode": false,
    "amount": 5,
    "unit": "minutes"
}

[toddb]

novu-dotnet/src/Novu.Domain/Models/Workflows/Step/DigestRegularMetadata.cs

Line 36 in 287f592

public UnitEnum BackoffUnit { get; set; }

Options

• make it optional but then it is probably dependent on backOffAmount
• have a default value (interestingly, auto generated code will default 0 to seconds but that is just an order issue).
• the openapi specs <=0.24.x don't have this rule pinned down

My sense is that enforcing sensible rules in the library will generally have a better experience for inexperienced users—usually I would look at the original code to see what is enforced (or not).

At this stage, happy to run with the strategy of making the serialised json as sparse as possible. Please feel free to chip in, happy also to take pull requests but would appreciate tests to be included.

Cheers

[lukeskrzypek-sf]

I was playing around with this, and it seems like the backend always requires BackoffUnit to be set to one of the valid string enum values even if none of the other backoff fields are used. The request completes successfully, but the step shows an error in the web dashboard.

So the easiest fix would probably be just to initialize it to one of the valid values by default so that it is always sent correctly even if the end user doesn't explicitly set it.

[toddb]

Basically, default is no backoff for 0 seconds?

[lukeskrzypek-sf]

I think so, although backoffAmount appears to be optional, but backoffUnit is mandatory.