what to do about old-style format patterns?

[pixelzoom]

Noted in code review #259, and related to general issue phetsims/scenery-phet#446.

Wave Interference is a new sim, but is using old-style format patterns (numbered placeholders), i.e.:

  "cmValue": {
    "value": "{0} cm"
  },
  "nmValue": {
    "value": "{0} nm"
  },

Creating more strings that use old-style seems like something that we want to avoid. Whether we do anything for Wave Interference depends on decisions for phetsims/scenery-phet#446.

[samreid]

Should we be using this pattern for now? phetsims/scenery-phet#317 (comment)

[pixelzoom]

If you need/want a quick fix, yes, handle the conversion from named to numbered placeholders in your code. And/or wait to see what is decided in phetsims/scenery-phet#446.

[samreid]

On hold until phetsims/scenery-phet#446 is decided.

[pixelzoom]

12/20/18 dev meeting consensus:

• New strings should use named placeholders, and that applies to Wave Interference.
• I will fix up NumberDisplay so that it works with both named and numbered placeholders, see new sims are using old-style formatting patterns scenery-phet#446.
• Until I get around to new sims are using old-style formatting patterns scenery-phet#446, Wave Interference can apply the workaround in Should we use named placeholders in common code? scenery-phet#317 (comment) to convert {{value}} to {0} before passing to NumberControl, NumberDisplay, etc.

[pixelzoom]

12/28/18 update: NumberDisplay (and therefore NumberControl) now supports both named and numbered placeholders, see phetsims/scenery-phet#446 (comment). So there is no need to apply the workaround in this sim. You can simply use {{value}} in your English translated strings, and pass them to NumberControl.

[samreid]

Proposed fix is pushed, @pixelzoom can you please review? By the way, thanks for fixing that!

[pixelzoom]

👍 Closing.