Project diagnostics flickers on unsaved multibuffer changes

[rpadaki]

Summary

When fixing the last error in the project diagnostics multibuffer, the error disappears before I'm able to save it, leading to flickering.

Steps to trigger the problem:

1. Open a project with no diagnostic errors/warnings (I used a Go project)
2. Introduce a code change that creates a single error and save
3. Close all tabs except for the Project Diagnostics
4. In the project diagnostics multibuffer, fix the error (but don't save)

Actual Behavior:

At least for my Go project, the unsaved change to fix the error clears the error from the Project Diagnostics tab. But this also clears the multibuffer, so I no longer have a way to view or save these unsaved changes!

If I close the tab, my unsaved changes are wiped without any confirmation dialog.

If I leave the tab open, I start seeing flickering where the error diagnostic shows back up, appears in the multibuffer, is fixed by the re-applied untracked changes, and disappears.

Expected Behavior:

I'm honestly not sure what a good UX would be here, but I would certainly hope to be able to save my changes.

Zed Version and System Specs

Zed: v0.178.5 (Zed)
OS: macOS 15.0.0
Memory: 16 GiB
Architecture: aarch64

[notpeter]

Oh interesting. So gopls is proactively updating the diagnostics after you've fixed it without waiting for save to recheck. I haven't seen that before.

Can you provide a trivial example of this (steps from an empty directory) and any relevant settings so I can reproduce?

[rpadaki]

(Sorry for being lazy, I know I should just give you a repo to repro this)

---

I think many language servers actually proactively update diagnostics without waiting to save. I was able to reproduce a simple case of this with just a javascript file.

mkdir repro
cd repro

echo 'console.log("unfinished quote);' > file.js
zed .

Click on file.js in the file explorer. After the typescript language server starts up, you should 2 diagnostic errors in your status bar. Open the diagnostics tab by clicking on the status bar.

Now, close the file.js tab. In the diagnostics tab, fix the unterminated " but do not save.

The project diagnostics should immediately clear! There is no way to save your change. If you open file.js again, your changes will not be reflected or savable.

---

That said, I think the "flickering" behavior where the errors start flickering in and out on top of this might be Go-specific. For a repro there, just do

mkdir repro
cd repro

go mod init repro

cat << EOF > file.go
package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
    fmt.Println("unfinished quote)
}
EOF

Similar process. Click on file.go in the file explorer, open the diagnostics tab, close file.go, and fix the unterminated " in the diagnostics tab without saving.

Diagnostics should clear for a moment, but now every time you click on the body of the diagnostics tab, it'll re-detect the diagnostics for a split-second before clearing again.

For the full flickering effect, keep the diagnostics tab open and Cmd+, to open the setting tab (for example). The diagnostics tab should start flickering between green and red in the background.

[asger-noer]

Having this issue as well. Seems like this also causes the diagnostics panel to clear completely before you actually get to save the new, fixed, state of the file.

[github-actions]

Hi there! 👋
We're working to clean up our issue tracker by closing older bugs that might not be relevant anymore. If you are able to reproduce this issue in the latest version of Zed, please let us know by commenting on this issue, and it will be kept open. If you can't reproduce it, feel free to close the issue yourself. Otherwise, it will close automatically in 14 days.
Thanks for your help!

[rpadaki]

Not sure what particular changed fixed this but this is fixed!