fix(workflow): a failed Tasks load is shown as an empty board in "Hand a task to a Workflow" #1458

Written-by: FlyBot Product

Line numbers as of 53d2c025 (2026-10-27); #1456 and #1461 touched this file but did not change the Assign dialog.
Line numbers drift: identify by symbol (AssignModal, confirmAssign, loadTasks), not by number.

What happens

Same dialog as #1457, different root cause: when the Tasks board cannot be loaded, "Hand a task to a Workflow" does not say the load failed — it renders the empty-board hint No open tasks on the Tasks board. and leaves Assign clickable. #1457 is the missing preselection on a board that did load; fixing that preselection does not fix this one.

Measured with the host call throwing host is busy:

• PROBE L shows empty hint: true
• PROBE L shows any error text: false
• PROBE L has wf-err node: 0

So a user whose Tasks call fails is told there is nothing to assign. No error, no retry, and no way to tell this apart from a genuinely empty board.

Reproduction

plugins/workflow/client.js is exercised through the hook renderer used by plugins/workflow/test/client.test.js. Stub the host bridge to throw for the tasks call, mount client.Section, click the sidebar row, settle one tick, then read the rendered text:

const prev = globalThis.__flybot__
globalThis.__flybot__ = { host: async () => { throw new Error('host is busy') } }
const view = mount(client.Section, { roster: { bots: [] }, call, actions: {} })
await settle()
findAll(view.tree, n => n.props?.className === 'wf-row wf-assign-row')[0].props.onClick()
await settle()
const text = textOf(view.tree)
text.includes('No open tasks on the Tasks board.')   // true
text.includes('host is busy')                        // false
findAll(view.tree, n => String(n.props?.className ?? '').includes('wf-err')).length // 0

Root cause

• loadTasks() swallows the failure and turns it into "no rows" — plugins/workflow/client.js:1059-1061:

  } catch (loadError) {
    void loadError
    setTasks([])
  }

  The missing-bridge path lies the same way: :1050 — if (typeof host !== 'function') { setTasks([]); return }.
• the render knows only tasks.length === 0, never why — :656-657:

  tasks.length === 0
    ? h('div', { className: 'wf-muted wf-cards-empty' }, tr('No open tasks on the Tasks board.'))

• AssignModal has no error surface at all: no error state and no .wf-err node. The same file already renders one elsewhere — :788 h('div', { className: 'wf-err', role: 'alert' }, error) — this modal simply never got it.
• Assign stays live regardless — :684 renders the button unconditionally.

This failure mode is new with #1452 (f0133279), which replaced the fixture task list with the real host tasks call: before it the list could not fail, so there was nothing to swallow.

Expected

1. A failed Tasks load shows an explicit message in the dialog (the host's message, or a generic "Could not load the Tasks board"), plus a Retry control that re-runs loadTasks().
2. On failure the dialog must not render No open tasks on the Tasks board. — that text is reserved for a load that succeeded and returned zero rows.
3. While the load has failed (and while it is still in flight), Assign must not be clickable — the same rule fix(workflow): the Assign button in "Hand a task to a Workflow" does nothing until you click a card #1457 asks for on an empty board.

Fixing together

This can ship in the same PR as #1457 with Fixes #1457, Fixes #<this issue>: both are the Assign dialog's missing state, and one loader that carries a status covers either shape. The two issues are separate findings and should not be merged into one or closed against each other.

Reachability

The running instance is at e37f1f8 (2026-10-26T12:57:03Z), which predates the Workflow surface, so this dialog is not yet visible to users; the measurement above is on f0133279 (2026-10-27T13:12:58Z). Still worth fixing before the surface ships.

Duplicate check

Search over open and closed issues as of my read: "No open tasks on the Tasks board" → 1 result (#1457); workflow assign tasks load error → 1 result (#1457); "Hand a task to a Workflow" assign → 1 result (#1457). That issue covers the lost preselection; no issue covers the swallowed load error being reported as an empty board.