STRING inputs changed by Javascript

[sarashinai]

I have a custom node that changes the readonly textarea attached to a STRING widget (widget.element.value) through Javascript. In previous Comfy versions, the node worked as expected. On running of the workflow, the node's function received the value of the textarea.

Now, the value received by the function isn't updating. To test, I removed the readonly attribute and manually entered text which was received by the function. There seems to be something missing between the manual input (which works) and the dynamic change via Javascript (which doesn't).

Does anyone know what I need to do to make Comfy recognize the change in textarea value?

[173787247]

Re: STRING inputs changed by Javascript

Lock the variables before assuming a logic bug:

1. Exact version (not “latest”) and OS
2. Minimal repro: clean profile/session, extra plugins off
3. First error block (missing from the post — add it if you can)

No replies yet — a minimal repro (version + one command + first error) will get you a maintainer faster than a long essay.
Repo: comfyanonymous/ComfyUI. With those three, this is usually install vs config vs upstream. Searching the title keywords in Issues avoids duplicating a known thread.

[vavo]

widget.element.value only changes the textarea DOM element. It does not update the LiteGraph widget value that ComfyUI serializes into the prompt.

Update the widget itself and invoke its callback if the widget has one:

const nextValue = "new text";
widget.value = nextValue;
widget.callback?.(nextValue);
node.setDirtyCanvas?.(true, true);

The important line is widget.value = nextValue. Current frontend extension guidance explicitly treats widget.value as the supported read/write surface. Writing directly to widget.element.value bypasses that state, which explains why manual typing works while the JavaScript assignment does not.

[sarashinai]

That was absolutely it! Thank you!

Is the "frontend extension guidance" something I can access? I'm going to be doing a lot of this kind of stuff and I'd rather read the documentation before bothering people with these minor fiddly things.