A default value with an expression referencing self fails with an error

[TheHyphen]

I have this .esdl file:

    type Employee {
        required property name -> str;
        required property prefix -> str;
        property nameWithPrefix -> str {
            default := (.prefix ++ .name);
        }
    }

but when I try to create a migration, it fails with:

edgedb error: QueryError: could not resolve partial path
edgedb error: cannot proceed until .esdl files are fixed

Are expressions referring self not allowed as default values?

[msullivan]

Yeah, we currently don't allow referencing self in default variables.

It should probably be possible to implement, though... I'll think about it.

[mcgrealife]

+1 for this feature.

My use case:

  # preferred, but does not work.
  type Example1 {
    required property name_source -> str;
    property name_editable -> str {
      default := .name_source;
    }
  }

  # requires extra property, but works.
  type Example2 {
    required property name_source -> str;
    required property name_editable -> str;
    property name := .name_editable ?? .name_source;
  }

[Arrow7000]

My use case is for a messaging application, where I want to keep track of all preceding messages in a reply thread. My schema:

type Message {
    required property name -> str;
    required property content -> str;
    required property timestamp -> datetime;

    # What this message is a reply to (if it is a reply)
    link replyTo -> Message;

    # This should return all the preceding messages in a reply thread
    multi link earlierReplies -> Message {
        default := distinct .replyTo union .replyTo.earlierReplies;
    }
}

Without this I'm going to have to query for the replied to message's .earlierReplies and manually add those results into the insert statement of the new message I'm creating, every time I create a new message.