Counter Widget error when connected to a Table without a filter applied inside dashboards

[giohappy]

Description

When a Counter widget is linked to a Table widget with no filters applied, an error is returned by the WPS process, and the Counter widget fails to render.

How to reproduce

• Add a table to a dashboard
• Create a Counter widget and connect it to the table
• The counter shows an error unless a filter is set on the table (for example by connecting a Map to the Table and settings a filter on any column)

Expected Result
A counter widget connected to a table widget in a dashboard shows the result whether the table has a filter applied or not.

Current Result
A counter widget connected to a table widget in a dashboard only works if a filter is applied to the table, otherwise, an error is returned.

• Not browser related

Other useful information

The problem is that the Counter widget sends an empty Filter element inside the <wps:Input> Query element, and the WPS process returns the following exception:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<ows:ExceptionReport xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:ows="http://www.opengis.net/ows/1.1" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" version="1.1.0" xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.opengis.net/ows/1.1 https://development.demo.geonode.org/geoserver/schemas/ows/1.1.0/owsAll.xsd">
    <ows:Exception exceptionCode="NoApplicableCode">
        <ows:ExceptionText>Could not parse XML request.
Parsing failed for Query: java.lang.RuntimeException: Unable to set property: Filter for eobject: {http://www.opengis.net/wfs}QueryType
Unable to set property: Filter for eobject: {http://www.opengis.net/wfs}QueryType
class java.lang.String cannot be cast to class org.geotools.api.filter.Filter (java.lang.String is in module java.base of loader &amp;apos;bootstrap&amp;apos;; org.geotools.api.filter.Filter is in unnamed module of loader org.apache.catalina.loader.ParallelWebappClassLoader @1c80e49b)</ows:ExceptionText>
    </ows:Exception>
</ows:ExceptionReport>

If the empty Filter is removed, the process executes as expected.

[tdipisa]

@dsuren1 please investigate this issue and report back here with also an estimate in pts..

Consider the following:

1 - It should be possible to connect a counter to a table or to a map if both are available. MS should asks the user to select one of them, otherwise, the connection is automatically performed to the available one. If only the first is available, currently that connection is somehow broken also in 2024.02 series but working in previous versions (eg. 2024.01 series).
2 - The tooltip is anyway not correct

[dsuren1]

Investigation outcome

The issue is caused by empty filter resulting in payload to have empty block <ogc:Filter></ogc:Filter> causing backend to throw parsing exception. The reason it worked fine in pervious iteration (2024.01.xx) was due to payload resulting in <ogc:Filter><ogc:And>undefined</ogc:And></ogc:Filter> and it avoided exception from backend. This was modified in subsequent iteration by this PR (#10696).

Solution

Avoid empty ogcFilter block formation when filter objects are empty in dependenciesToFilter enhancer. This should avoid parse exception.

[giohappy]

@dsuren1 is additional work required in case we decide to backport the fix to 2024.02.xx?

[dsuren1]

@giohappy I don’t believe any additional work is needed apart from backporting and testing