A required field whose `defaultValue` is a runtime token (`NOW()` / `current_user`) cannot be submitted from a create form

[yinlianghui]

Found while implementing #4047 (PR #4068). Filed unassigned; not fixed there, because it needs a decision the card did not cover.

What happens

@objectstack/spec lets a field's defaultValue be a runtime instruction rather than a value — the DEFAULT_VALUE_TOKENS family ('NOW()', 'current_user') or a CEL Expression envelope { dialect, source }. The server resolves those per insert, in ObjectQL.applyFieldDefaults, for any field that arrives absent or null.

A create form therefore cannot seed them: putting the literal text NOW() into a datetime input and submitting it as the field's value suppresses the very resolution the declaration asked for (applyFieldDefaults only fills fields that arrive empty). PR #4068 makes every object-form container leave such fields empty for exactly that reason.

That is correct for an optional field. Combined with required: true it is not:

remind_at: Field.datetime({ required: true, defaultValue: 'NOW()' }),

The control opens empty, the client-side required rule refuses the submit, and there is nothing sensible for the user to type — the declaration already said what the value is, and the server would have supplied it had the field simply been omitted. This is the same shape as #4047 (required + a default producing the worst create experience of any modelling choice), one layer down: #4047 covered the static half, this is the runtime half.

Why it is not just "seed it client-side"

Resolving these in the browser means evaluating CEL, and reproducing the server's clock / actor / timezone snapshot, in a second place. Two implementations of one contract is how they drift. So the fix is a design choice, not a patch, which is why it is filed rather than folded into #4068.

Rough options, for whoever picks this up:

• A. Suppress the client-side required rule when the field declares a runtime defaultValue and the form is in create mode. The field is not really "missing" — the producer guarantees a value at insert. Cheap and local; the control still reads oddly (a required marker over an empty input the user is allowed to skip).
• B. Render a resolved preview value, non-authoritative — show "now" for NOW(), the acting user for current_user — and still omit the field from the payload so the server resolves it. Reads best; needs a display-only path that is not confusable with a real value, and needs the actor/clock, which the form does not have today.
• C. Have the server serve resolved defaults with the object schema (a per-request resolvedDefaults alongside fields), so the form seeds real values from the one authority. Cleanest contract, largest surface — an API change in the framework repo.
• D. Rule it an authoring error and reject required: true + a runtime defaultValue at publish/lint time.

Not measured how many real declarations hit this: defaultValue: 'NOW()' is common on platform objects, but those columns are typically not required in the authored sense. Severity is for triage to grade — filing it plainly rather than sitting on it.

Reproduce

packages/plugin-form/src/createDefaults.test.tsx (added in #4068) already renders the runtime-token case and asserts the control is empty; make that field required: true and attempt a submit.

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[yinlianghui]

Triage (objectui seat PM, session session_017Qqyix2QcnpUC9XeYVDzx3, 2026-08-10): needs-user-decision.

The defect is real and one layer below the just-landed #4047 fix (PR #4068 correctly leaves runtime-token defaults empty for the server; the client-side required rule then blocks the submit with nothing sensible to type). But the four dispositions the filer lays out genuinely diverge on product semantics — suppress the client rule for server-resolved defaults, render a non-authoritative preview, have the server serve resolved defaults, or reject the required+runtime-default combination at publish time — and two of them touch the framework contract. Client-side CEL evaluation is already ruled out by the one-contract-one-implementation discipline. Not dispatched until ruled; not a v17 board item (the combination has no measured occurrence in the shipped showcase apps — if one is found, re-grade).

This seat's leaning, recorded for the ruling and not acted on: the publish-time rejection (option 4) fits declared=enforced best long-term, but it is breaking for existing metadata, which is exactly why it needs the maintainer's call.

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[os-zhuang]

Maintainer ruling (2026-08-10, directed in session session_01BPWqbmEFU8gJepBJTHESXd): Option A now; B may layer on later; C and D rejected.

• A: in create mode, a field declaring a runtime defaultValue (token or CEL envelope) suppresses the client-side required rule and is omitted from the payload — the producer guarantees the value at insert, so the field is not "missing". Single authority preserved, no client-side re-implementation of the server's clock/actor.
• B (resolved preview, display-only) is welcome as a follow-up UX card once a non-authoritative display path exists — it must not block A.
• C (server-resolved defaults in the schema response) is not justified by this card alone — largest surface, separate framework decision if more cases accumulate.
• D is rejected: required: true + runtime default is coherent authoring (storage-level required, producer-guaranteed), not an error. Lint may warn on the UX consequence, not refuse.

needs-user-decision → pm:queue.

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[yinlianghui]

Claim: PM loop round 4 (objectui whole-repo seat; maintainer-ruled card, Option A)
Session: session_017Qqyix2QcnpUC9XeYVDzx3
Branch: claude/issue-4069-required-runtime-default
Worktree: objectui-issue-4069
Domain: repo:objectui (whole-repo seat)
File surface: packages/plugin-form (client-side required rule path + create-mode payload assembly; createDefaults.test.tsx extension) and, only if the rule lives there, the shared validation helper in packages/fields. ⛔ No server/framework changes — Option C was explicitly rejected in the ruling.
Serial constraints checked: #3569 / PR #4083 touches plugin-form's deriveMasterDetail.ts + fields' GridField.tsx — different files from the required-rule path; #4041 landed. Low collision risk, noted for the dev to rebase if #4083 merges mid-flight.
Container & model: M, mode:subagent, model: opus

Ruling in hand (maintainer, 2026-08-10, comment above): Option A now — in create mode, a field declaring a runtime defaultValue (token or CEL envelope) suppresses the client-side required rule and is omitted from the payload; the producer guarantees the value at insert. B may layer on later (separate card), C and D rejected (D's note: lint may warn, not refuse — but lint work is NOT in this card's scope).

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[yinlianghui]

ACCEPT (objectui seat PM, session session_017Qqyix2QcnpUC9XeYVDzx3, review of record) — PR #4084, implementing the maintainer's Option A ruling verbatim.

What shipped: one classifier, two consumers — #4068's runtime-default test lifted to isRuntimeDefault with isSeedableDefault re-expressed on top (seeding and validation cannot disagree), then isRequiredInForm(field, isCreate) replacing the four required: sites and omitServerResolvedDefaults in each container's create branch. The payload-omission half is real, not belt-and-braces: the dev caught that JSON.stringify was hiding present-but-undefined keys, and that a focused-then-left control yields '' — which is neither absent nor null and would store a blank, defeating the declaration. Both dispositions the ruling rejected stayed out (no server change, no lint rule); the marker/aria-required follows the rule in create mode — deliberate, flagged, and it removes the "required marker over a skippable input" oddity the filer noted under A. requiredWhen correctly NOT widened into — filed as #4085 for a ruling (a conditional-required may be the author's claim about what the user must supply; it plausibly outranks the default, so it is not obviously the same answer).

Review notes: premise reproduced on origin/main first with the issue's own recipe (create.calls = [] → refused), fixed-state probes show the create landing with the field absent and typed values passing through; reverse verification in the predicted direction with the two boundary pins (static-literal cleared / edit blanked) correctly STAYING green; downstream sweep with the prefix filter, 346 files / 3244 tests on the console+app-shell closure. 19 of 20 checks green including both changeset gates.

The sole red — Build & E2E — is proven inherited: byte-identical failure on main at the PR's exact base 9154d9e90, two preceding main runs green, filed as #4086. That is a MAIN-health problem this seat is taking over right now as top priority (it makes every open PR carry a red gate). #4084's auto-merge is armed; it lands the moment main's red is resolved (fix or flake-rerun), not by merging past a red.

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