bot.beginDialog causes unexpected message if dialog already open

[cooperka]

Issue

Using bot.beginDialog or bot.replaceDialog when there's already a dialog open (e.g. to switch to the new dialog based on user input) causes the bot to automatically receive an unexpected {} message.

This message breaks questions, because the empty message is interpreted by botkit as an answer to the question, and the user doesn't have a chance to give input.

Demo

I made a simple working demo app here that you can clone to see the issue.

1. Start the emulator
2. Say hi to trigger ONBOARDING_DIALOG
3. Say anything for your name
4. Say yes to confirm and trigger ONBOARDING_DIALOG_2
5. onboarding2 asks for your name, and immediately receives {} as a response without your input. It's impossible to reply with your name.

Workaround

See this commit for a successful workaround using dialog.addGotoDialog instead of bot.beginDialog.

It's great that this works, but it isn't possible to use this in all cases (e.g. this issue).

Context

• Botkit version: 4.6.1
• Messaging Platform: Emulator
• Node version: 10.15.3
• OS: Mac 10.14

[stale]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.

[cooperka]

[not stale, looks like others have experienced as well]

[benbrown]

I FINALLY FIGURED THIS OUT!

[benbrown]

This had to do with the fact that, inside the handler, the active dialog was changing.

AFTER the handler is run, it attempts to continue on to the next step.

Since the dialog had changed, it resumed improperly.
I believe that the proper behavior is to end the turn, because the new child dialog has taken control.

Still some work to do to validate but I think this will be addressed soon.

[benbrown]

OK! This is going to be addressed in the next release. HOWEVER, there is a follow up bug that I discovered while fixing this.

Calling beginDialog from an ask() will cause the next outgoing message in that dialog to be skipped. :/

#1932