TypeError: this.inputElement is null

[tbl0605]

Hi,
I'm getting a "TypeError: this.inputElement is null" error when using vue-simple-suggest on custom inputs and using Webpack's lazy loading globally (in "eager" mode) with prefetch disabled.
The bug occurs only the first time a view component is used (because of lazy loading), further instances seem to work correctly.

The problem is (somehow) also described here: https://forum.vuejs.org/t/not-getting-refs-in-mounted/12490
The root cause is that $refs is not always available in the mounted lifecycle hook.

I've created a projet to easily reproduce this issue (see the README.md file of the project for more details) :
https://github.com/tbl0605/vue-bug-simple-suggest

So basically this bug appears (for me) when:

• using "eager" mode on vue-router routes

component: () => import(/* webpackMode: "eager" */ './views/MyView.vue')

• disabling prefetch in vue.config.js

config.plugins.delete('prefetch');

• using dynamic component loading

const componentContext = require.context(
  '@/components',
  true,
  /\w\d*\.vue$/i,
  'eager'
);
componentContext.keys().forEach(componentFilePath => {
  const componentName = upperFirst(
    camelCase(
      componentFilePath
        .split('/')
        .pop()
        .replace(/\.vue$/, '')
    )
  );
  const componentContent = componentContext(componentFilePath);
  const componentConfig = componentContent.default || componentContent;
  if (componentConfig instanceof Promise) {
    Vue.component(componentName, () => componentConfig);
  } else {
    Vue.component(componentName, componentConfig);
  }
});

Workaround:

I've patched the mounted method in vue-simple-suggest.vue to delay initialization to be done after the first component rendering:

  mounted () {
    setTimeout(() => {
      this.inputElement = this.$refs['inputSlot'].querySelector('input')
      this.setInputAriaAttributes()
      this.prepareEventHandlers(true)
    }, 0)
  }

Maybe it can be done otherwise, but in my case, it works well ;)

[kaskar2008]

Hello, @tbl0605!

Thank you for this bug report. Sorry for the long reply.