recompose

[willmcgugan]

This is an attempt to allow recompose to keep some widgets.

If a recomposed widget has the same id, it will have its state copied from the newly composed widget, rather than being removed.

[merriam]

I'm looking at this. I see "let's compose a new widget with stuff from previous widgets" and my analyst hairs rise on the back of my neck.

So, first, what is the use case? I can only think of cases where a hidden widget or ContentSwitcher should be in design time. As the layout is not interactive in the API, I cannot see where 'I need to change what I didn't know'? There are cases for copying trees, in order to keep the code clean, but replacing?

Second, what is state? If I change a Label to a Static does the value stay? The formatting? Only the formatting not derived from DEFAULT_CSS? Current focus? Is this meaning of State different from all other meanings?

Third, is there a more traditional approach? Something like shippingAddressWidget = copy_widgets(prefix='ship-', from_prefix='bill-")?