Discovery on FileField (file uploads)

[annekainicUSDS]

Discovery needed on FileField component, which enables file uploads, and how that can be generally usable by the library. Right now it doesn't return the response expected. Look into FileField behavior and how it interacts with the server.

[kaschm-usds]

Let me know if I can help with discovery - we are using this for a form prototype so I have real-life examples ;)

[jcmeloni-usds]

Anne - what does it return?

This is possibly something that Dave can help with as getting-started/low-hanging fruit once he gets onboard and integrated this week (meeting invites forthcoming on that).

[jcmeloni-usds]

@annekainicUSDS @dmethvin-gov Is there a tl;dr on conversations/plans/thoughts you all have had about file upload in the library?

[dmethvin-gov]

I think we want the ability to upload files for sure, but the uploading and back-end part are out of our control and vary depending on the technology used at the server. We can make the user interface pretty consistent but the actual uploading ends up with server-specific code or behavior. For example, the current code makes assumptions about how the server replies (429 ratelimits, JSON responses) and sets the upload progress bar to account for Amazon S3 behavior.

We can create a typical example of what an upload function looks and define its inputs and outputs, but I'm not sure we should try to generalize it enough to make it a library call. If the basic fileUpload() function doesn't work for their case they can easily copy it and add whatever specialized code they need.

[jcmeloni-usds]

@dmethvin-gov Ok cool. I like it. I'll make a ticket that specifies just that, and close this after I do that.

[annekainicUSDS]

Steps needed on this ticket:

1. Follow up with Austin team to find out how they implemented document upload feature
2. Decide how we want to address this feature in our library: either as a full feature (unlikely) or as guidance or steps to implement it in our documentation

[dmethvin-gov]

File uploads are something the library should do but we don't have enough information on the different types of backends to create a good abstraction yet. If someone is blocked and needs this, we'd welcome a solution that lets the library call an external function to achieve the upload. I would guess that involves replacing the built-in UploadFile function with a ui:options.uploadFile function property that can set whatever flags are needed by the target server.