How to add features in strict mode in 1.4.1?

[paul]

I think 1.4.1 introduced a regression here: v1.4.0...v1.4.1#diff-96a4545cdba96c81f7db7030c61b5f7a347a2a9e848b3ec81fb7806c9dc8786aR42

I have code like this in my spec setup, to just enable add the feature flags for tests:

RSpec.configure do |config|
  config.before do
    Rails.configuration.x.feature_flags.each { |flag| Flipper.enable(flag) }

When dependabot bumped the gem version from 1.4.0 to 1.4.1, now all the specs fail:

Flipper::Adapters::Strict::NotFound:
  Could not find feature "player_search". Call `Flipper.add("player_search")` to create it.
# ./vendor/bundler/ruby/4.0.0/gems/flipper-1.4.1/lib/flipper/adapters/strict.rb:69:in 'Flipper::Adapters::Strict#assert_feature_exists'
# ./vendor/bundler/ruby/4.0.0/gems/flipper-1.4.1/lib/flipper/adapters/strict.rb:43:in 'Flipper::Adapters::Strict#add'

Following the error message, I updated my code to this:

    Rails.configuration.x.feature_flags.each do |flag|
      Flipper.add(flag.to_s)
      Flipper.enable(flag.to_s)
    end

But I get the same error, for the same thing, on the line where I'm doing the add. Looking at the change linked above, it seems like the .add method was implemented on Strict, informing the user they need to call Flipper.add before they can call Flipper.add.

Either the message needs to be updated, or that change to the add method needs to be reverted, since its not clear how to add features if you can't add them. The commit message talks about "sync mode", but its not documented outside that comment, that I can tell.

I fixed it like this, but this feels like I'm digging into flipper internals that I shouldn't be:

RSpec.configure do |config|
  config.before do
    Flipper::Adapters::Strict.with_sync_mode do
      Rails.configuration.x.feature_flags.each do |flag|
        Flipper.add(flag.to_s)
        Flipper.enable(flag.to_s)
      end
    end
  end
end

[Jell]

chiming in to say that this definitely looks "buggy" in that if it's intended behavior the error message should at least be "correct": if the solution is indeed to wrap the add(:feature) call inside a with_sync_mode block then the error message should say that (because as of now it's very confusing to get an error that says "Call Flipper.add(:feature) to create it." on a line of code that literally does that 😅)