[UI/UX:Forum] Fix search clear by GarvitKhandelwal31 · Pull Request #12622 · Submitty/Submitty

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-03-21T21:03:49Z

Why is this Change Important & Necessary?

Fixes #12619.

The Discussion Forum search bar is high traffic and had several UX regressions:

Clear x icon briefly appeared when search was empty.
Clear x icon appeared on Create Thread even when no text was entered.
Search text persisted across reload/navigation, which could silently filter results.
Search/filter interaction could trigger unsaved-changes warnings unexpectedly.
Toggling the clear x icon caused subtle layout shift in the search input width.

This PR resolves those issues to make forum filtering behavior more predictable and polished.

What is the New Behavior?

The clear x control is integrated inside the search input area.
The clear x is hidden when search is empty, and only shown when text exists.
Search text no longer persists across reload/navigation.
Search/filter interactions no longer trigger false unsaved-changes warnings.
Clear Filters visibility stays consistent with active filters/search state.
Input width remains stable when the clear x appears/disappears.

What steps should a reviewer take to reproduce or test the bug or new feature?

Open Discussion Forum main page.
Expected: search input is visible, clear x is hidden initially.

Wait briefly after load.
Expected: clear x does not flash on/off when input is empty.

Screen.Recording.2026-03-22.020718.mp4

Type a term in search input (for example, markdown), then click Search.
Expected: thread list is filtered and clear x is visible inside the input.

Observe the search input while clear x appears/disappears.
Expected: no input width shrink or horizontal layout shift.
Click the clear x.
Expected: search input clears, clear x hides, filtered list resets to unfiltered state.
Apply a comment/question/unread filter plus a search term.
Expected: Clear Filters appears.

Click Clear Filters.
Expected: search text clears, selected filters reset, Clear Filters hides when nothing is active.

No search bar in create threads page-

Unmatched results in search-
Previously if search results did not matched, it showed all of them.
But now it shows no threads found.

Warning shown on unsaved changes-
In create threads page, if a user edits the title, or description and try to reload or navigate to other page, a warning message appears saying there are unsaved changes-
https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/19d0a7fc-8163-4a82-80c5-6b79eb0d0c11
In dark mode, if no results matched, error looks like this-

Automated Testing & Documentation

Manual verification completed using the steps above.
No automated tests were added in this PR.
No submitty.org documentation updates are required, since behavior is a UI bugfix refinement of existing forum search/filter interactions.

Other information

Breaking change: No.
Migrations required: No.
Security impact: None identified.

codecov · 2026-03-22T06:14:27Z

Codecov Report

❌ Patch coverage is 0% with 1 line in your changes missing coverage. Please review.
✅ Project coverage is 21.62%. Comparing base (3edad87) to head (06f94c8).

Additional details and impacted files

@@            Coverage Diff            @@
##               main   #12622   +/-   ##
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JManion32

Functionality is significantly improved so far. Everything specified in the original issue is addressed. A few more things:

Let's remove that forum search bar header from the create threads page, and move the Back to Threads button to the top right of the create thread container. Forum search has zero functionality there.
Currently when no threads are found via search, it shows all of them. It should show no threads as it did before, and maybe we could include a message where the threads would be saying no threads found?

Overall, great job with this. I will do a more thorough functionality / code review once these small changes are made, and CI is passing (I just approved the workflows so it may already be fine).

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-03-22T06:57:46Z

Thanks for the review.
Updates-
I have made a commit for your two more suggested features and updated description on how to verify them.

The previous workflow check failed on CI( Gradeable)-
My analysis on that-
My changes were limited to form-only related files, but the check failed on from a different spec cypress/e2e/Cypress-Gradeable/late_submission_warning_messages.spec.js, given scope and failure location it looks like an existing, intermittent Gradeables CI issue.

Rkoester47

These are great changes and improve the quality of life for the search feature. One small issue that I found in my testing was that the message displayed for no results is very difficult to read in dark mode. This should be addressed, but otherwise great work.

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-03-24T18:54:51Z

Hey, thanks so reviewing my PR. I have fixed the issue. Now it looks like this-

Also updated the description

JManion32

The banner should not be light in dark mode. Please use a darker color.

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-03-25T15:30:26Z

How's this?

JManion32

The padding at the top seems to have changed on the view threads and create thread pages:

View Threads:

Create Threads:

Let's just make sure the padding stays the same even though we are moving things around.

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-03-29T00:16:36Z

My apologies for the late reply.

JManion32

I would just like to see the padding be consistent between the headers on these 2 pages (screenshots in dark mode so its easier to see the contrast):

On the create thread page, there is just less space. I want the Create Thread and Back to Threads buttons to be in the same spot on the screen, but since the create thread page has less padding in the header, they are not.

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-04-05T16:46:05Z

@JManion32 I think the padding is decent now.

Rkoester47 · 2026-04-07T16:14:04Z

@JManion32 I think the padding is decent now.

I just checked out your branch, and the padding for these two pages still seems to be different. The spacing above these elements should match.

Create Thread Button

Back to Threads Button

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-04-07T19:14:20Z

Hey @Rkoester47 , I have tried doing the same, but to me it looks good-

Rkoester47

After installing your branch again, I also see the matching padding between both pages.

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-04-22T16:03:21Z

Hey one thing today came into my mind, we can do one more thing in the search in discussion forum-
Lets say we search markdown in the bar, then in the results it should highlight markdown with some color, I think this would make much more sense.
If you would want I can add this too. @JManion32 @Rkoester47

JManion32 · 2026-04-30T22:25:33Z

Hey one thing today came into my mind, we can do one more thing in the search in discussion forum- Lets say we search markdown in the bar, then in the results it should highlight markdown with some color, I think this would make much more sense. If you would want I can add this too. @JManion32 @Rkoester47

This sounds like a separate issue for another PR to me.

JManion32

Great work @GarvitKhandelwal31 ! To fix those padding changes once and for all, I have a proposal:

Remove the margin top/left/right for create-thread-header
Remove padding: 0; from forum_content

I think this looks much better:

GarvitKhandelwal31 · 2026-05-01T09:43:42Z

Great work @GarvitKhandelwal31 ! To fix those padding changes once and for all, I have a proposal:

Remove the margin top/left/right for create-thread-header

Remove padding: 0; from forum_content

I think this looks much better:

Done, I have also cross checked again, and functionality looks unharmed.

dagemcn

Functionality works great, no issues I could find, and previous bugs and padding issues have been resolved. Tested in light and dark mode.

Fix forum search UX regressions and filter persistence issues

03472f4

github-project-automation Bot added this to Submitty Development Mar 21, 2026

github-project-automation Bot moved this to Seeking Reviewer in Submitty Development Mar 21, 2026

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

69ff6a3

JManion32 requested changes Mar 22, 2026

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github-project-automation Bot moved this from Seeking Reviewer to Work in Progress in Submitty Development Mar 22, 2026

[UI/UX:Forum] Refine create and empty search

ba4845a

JManion32 mentioned this pull request Mar 23, 2026

[BUGFIX:Forum] Fix search bar UI papercuts #12627

Closed

Rkoester47 requested changes Mar 24, 2026

View reviewed changes

[UI/UX:Forum] Improve no-results contrast in dark mode

90e16ad

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

88b975d

JManion32 requested changes Mar 24, 2026

View reviewed changes

[UI/UX:Forum] Darken no-results banner in dark mode

51847e0

JManion32 requested changes Mar 26, 2026

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Comment thread site/app/templates/forum/createThread.twig Outdated

GarvitKhandelwal31 added 2 commits March 29, 2026 05:45

[UI/UX:Forum] Simplify create-thread back button wiring

9e1ed21

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

04bf5d6

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

0adbe87

GarvitKhandelwal31 requested a review from JManion32 March 29, 2026 16:52

automateprojectmangement Bot moved this from Work in Progress to In Review in Submitty Development Mar 29, 2026

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

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JManion32 requested changes Mar 31, 2026

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github-project-automation Bot moved this from In Review to Work in Progress in Submitty Development Mar 31, 2026

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

9b41402

Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings April 1, 2026 14:01

automateprojectmangement Bot moved this from Work in Progress to In Review in Submitty Development Apr 1, 2026

Increase padding

a4b0f37

GarvitKhandelwal31 requested a review from JManion32 April 5, 2026 16:46

Increase padding further to match create threads button

cfa9a24

JManion32 mentioned this pull request Apr 7, 2026

[UI/UX:Forum] Fix search clear button visibility #12700

Closed

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

0b130cd

Rkoester47 approved these changes Apr 7, 2026

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Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

7b3beca

GarvitKhandelwal31 and others added 2 commits April 22, 2026 21:33

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

a0af532

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

995f23e

JManion32 requested changes Apr 30, 2026

View reviewed changes

github-project-automation Bot moved this from In Review to Work in Progress in Submitty Development Apr 30, 2026

GarvitKhandelwal31 added 2 commits May 1, 2026 15:12

remove unneccesary margin and padding

040b776

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

095e5d2

github-actions Bot added the Abandoned PR - Needs New Owner No activity on PR for more than 2 weeks -- seeking new owner to complete label May 16, 2026

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

8651e38

GarvitKhandelwal31 moved this from Work in Progress to Awaiting Maintainer Review in Submitty Development May 19, 2026

GarvitKhandelwal31 requested a review from JManion32 May 19, 2026 05:49

GarvitKhandelwal31 removed the Abandoned PR - Needs New Owner No activity on PR for more than 2 weeks -- seeking new owner to complete label May 19, 2026

automateprojectmangement Bot moved this from Awaiting Maintainer Review to In Review in Submitty Development May 19, 2026

GarvitKhandelwal31 and others added 3 commits May 29, 2026 15:04

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

748344e

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

45d35d4

Merge branch 'main' into forum-search1-clean

06f94c8

dagemcn approved these changes Jun 4, 2026

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bmcutler merged commit 8aefcc1 into Submitty:main Jun 8, 2026
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Why is this Change Important & Necessary?

What is the New Behavior?

What steps should a reviewer take to reproduce or test the bug or new feature?

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