The input/output properties displayed at each step show their CURRENT value instead of the value they held when the step was run (for inputs, you want to see what the step was GIVEN; for outputs, you want to see what the step PRODUCED).
Please update it so that the input/output properties at each step show the values they held at that step (or at least take away the displays for these properties so that it doesn’t misleadingly seem as if you’re seeing the value at the time the step was run).
Thank you for this valuable feedback. Certainly it would be good to know the state changes of values. It’s a balance to convey in the UI when properties are both input and output. I’ve logged this for the team to discuss and explore solutions.
@Rachel could you clarify one thing — usually the output properties of a step are not the same as the input properties (these are usually read-only).
I suspect you are referring to the dynamic “Other Properties” which often are both inputs and outputs? Is that correct? Here, we don’t distinguish between the inputs and the outputs and it would be good to do so.
There are cases where the same properties are inputs but also get augmented or overwritten as outputs of a step. But these are not very common.
Hi @Jen_ThunkAI / @praveen-Thunk.AI - Jen is on the right track - I am talking about the displays for the actual properties, not the Extra Properties thing.
It would be awesome if each property was capable of displaying the value it held when it was the input property and/or the output property at every step it was an input or output for. If I specify a property as an input or an output for a specific step, then the information I want from it is what the input was at that particular step or what the output was at that particular step (and if it was both an input and an output, then the property can be displayed twice, once showing the input value and once showing the output value).
if set as an input for a particular step: Show the value of the property right before the step potentially modified it (even if it doesn’t end up modifying it)
if set as an output for a particular step: Show the value of the property right after the step potentially modified it (even if it didn’t end up modifying it)
Makes sense Rachel. It’s something I’ve thought about too while developing Thunks.
One tip for this type of scenario, until the platform feature, is to use a string list property that can log information you want at certain times. I’ve used this pattern to write out a log occasionally of certain state changes. Say there is a property “ChangeLog” of String type and “IsListType” on. The description say that it is contains an append-only log of changes with timestamps of a certain format such as [MM-DD-YYY HH:MM]. Then within instructions, I can use it to say “Write the value of TitleDescriptor to the ChangeLog”. Then over time, I can see how that value was changing. It may be challenging to get it to write it twice – at the beginning and end of a set of instructions – so think about having it write it in the previous step. We can chat about this pattern more and whether it works for what you need.