Start Resources :counter first time they're used

[kaushalmodi]

Hello,

This is a follow-up issue which proposes a fix for the issue in #4334.

Here's a copy of the proposal from the discussion on discourse for convenience:

---

In the example I provided, there are 3 PDF files, and I wanted to first set the title of just one pdf file.

So the alternative you provided:

The counter is grouped by the matcher + first occurrence of either title or name.
If you had said:

[[resources]]
src = “documents/photo_specs.pdf”
[resources.params]
someParam = “foo”

[[resources]]
src = "**.pdf"
name = "pdf-file-:counter"
title = “Photo Specifications #:counter”

They would be in the same group.

would not work, as that would auto-set the titles of all 3 PDF files.

I thought that my original example:

[[resources]]
  src = "documents/photo_specs.pdf"
  title = "Photo Specifications"
[[resources]]
  src = "**.pdf"
  name = "pdf-file-:counter"

was unambiguous.. set title for just one file and counter-based name for all files.

If you have suggestions for improvement to the above, they are welcome, but those should come in form of a spec that takes any ambiguity into account.

How about:

"An individual counter should be grouped to matcher for each title and name, but only for the entities that use the :counter placeholder."

So in the example I posted, the counter will be grouped only with the second matcher, as only that uses :counter.

But if the example had been:

[[resources]]
  # using arbitrary glob
  src = "**s.pdf"  
  title = "PDF s #:counter"
[[resources]]
  src = "**.pdf"
  name = "pdf-file-:counter"

"documents/photo_specs.pdf" would get a title like "PDF s #1", but name like "pdf-file-3". This was quite an arbitrary example, and thus an arbitrary outcome.

But this would then allow a normal example like in my original post to work exactly as expected.

[kaushalmodi]

Thank you for taking care of this quickly! I confirm the fix; the exact same test in #4334 now works!

[kaushalmodi]

The older test in #4334 worked fine. But right now, I was trying to create a test case using the params used in 7b472e4 with 4 resource files (photo_specs.pdf, other_specs.pdf, guide.pdf, checklist.pdf), and I am finding strange results.

Here is the test case:

[[resources]]
  src = "*specs.pdf"
  title = "Specifications #:counter"
[[resources]]
  src = "**.pdf"
  name = "pdf-file-:counter"

It looks like the name and title counters are not yet independent..

• Both checklist.pdf and other_specs.pdf are getting the Name: pdf-file-1, and
• Both guide.pdf and photo_specs.pdf are getting the Name: pdf-file-2.

It's as if the matcher with title caused the name-counter to reset?

Do I need to create a new issue for this? Or can you reopen this?

---

Update (2018/01/29): The same test case now shows the correct results after the fix in df20b05. Thank you!

[bep]

It's as if the matcher with title caused the name-counter to reset?

Yes, this is by design. The counter is an item counter, but maybe we could loosen up on that restriction.

But in general, I'm not too keen on discussions in closed issues. I almost never read notifications on those. But don't start a new for this, I will think about it.

[kaushalmodi]

Thanks for fixing this! The same test now shows the intended results. 👍

[github-actions]

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