Silverstripe-framework: email templating broken

[NightJar]

@ScopeyNZ is this what I was experiencing the other day?
I feel like it might be.

For context, pretend we're trying to send an email with some customisations:

$extraData = ['Important' => 'value'];
// $this is a DataObject
$data = $this->customise($extraData);
// Imagine $template references a template containing "<p>An important $Important</p>"
$email->setHTMLTemplate($template);
$email->setData($data);
$email->send();
// receive: "<p>An important </p>"

[robbieaverill]

Does it work if you pass ArrayData::create($extraData) @NightJar ?

[NightJar]

Sorry I didn't find the time to try, but suspect the same result. These methods have worked this way in the past, so suddenly not would be either a bug, or a BC break - the latter being of interest as to _when_ they stopped working, and why that's different to the documentation.

DataObject inherits from ViewableData so should already be compatible, and customise returns a ViewableData_Customised, so in any of the cases I'd expect this to work. If the fault sits elsewhere (e.g. customise not being able to accept an array) then I'd still argue that while this is just a manifestation it is still relevant.

I'm not 100% sure these are the same issue, unfortunately I found @mikeyc7m 's post a bit confusing as to what the actual problem was. But reading the template section of the Email docs specifically, that's _almost_ equivalent to what I've listed out above - the only difference I see is that I'm not using a simple array, at least not as the data parameter to the email.

[ScopeyNZ]

My quick and dirty test code

PageController.php:

private static $allowed_actions = [
    'thing'
];

public function thing(HTTPRequest $request)
{
    $member = Security::getCurrentUser();
    $email = Email::create('[email protected]', '[email protected]', 'This is a subject');

    $data = $member->customise([]);

    $email->setHTMLTemplate('Includes/email/MemberEmail');
    $email->setData($data);

    $email->send();
}

templates/Includes/email/MemberEmail.ss:

<div>
    <h1>Hi $FirstName</h1>
    <p>Your email is <em>$Email</em></p>
</div>

Reproduces the issue.

However I feel this is a little different to the issue suggested by the OP.

[NightJar]

In anycase if this issue is systemic, as opposed to custom code in @ScopeyNZ and I's examples, and the default "reset password" is broken in core because of it, this is a major issue.
Particularly as that particular use-case will be a blocker to MFA work.

[NightJar]

@mikeyc7m The work around for this issue (at least in my case) is to use $email->setCustomisedObj($customisedObject)
I'm unsure if it'll work with e.g. ArrayData or plain arrays.

[robbieaverill]

I can reproduce that passing a ViewableData as the data for an email won't work in template variable calls, e.g.:

$email->setData(['FirstName' => 'Test']); // works when you call $FirstName in template

$member->customise([])->FirstName; // returns "default admin"
$member->customise([]); $email->setData($member); // empty when calling $FirstName in template

Email::setData() accepts a ViewableData object, which is where this bug is, so we need to fix that. This is related or perhaps the same problem as https://github.com/silverstripe/silverstripe-framework/issues/8302, which is "fixed".

I haven't had a chance yet to validate the other claims in the OP.

[purplespider]

• if you use setBody() or pass in anything as a body, the entire template is replaced by that body, ignoring any setHTMLTemplate directive.

Just spent >1.5 hours trying to work out why an e-mail template wasn't working after upgrading to SilverStripe 4, now I know! Well, at least it wasn't me. What's the latest on this?

[NightJar]

Reset password and other things are working for me now in 4.4.x-dev, however I've not had the time to go and re-check the specific reproduction steps listed above.

I don't know when/why/how this was fixed, and cannot be certain it is. If you could report back with what versions of the core modules you're using @purplespider that could help :)

[purplespider]

• if you use setBody() or pass in anything as a body, the entire template is replaced by that body, ignoring any setHTMLTemplate directive.

This is still an issue in 4.4.4. I managed to work around it by changing $email->setBody($body) to:
php $email->setData([ 'Body' => DBField::create_field('HTMLFragment', $body), ]);