199163 - [AxPlugin] Remove clever type conversion on PARAM properties

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Core Graveyard :: Embedding: APIs, defect)

Description

[Adam Lock]

The plugin should not turn PARAMs like this into numbers:

<param name="SessionID" value="0000455661519383483">

LegacyPlugin.cpp has code which uses the Win32 call VariantChangeType to store
params as numbers if they can be coerced that way. Some controls don't like this
at all (e.g. the upload control on shutterfly.com) and crash or go wrong. The
plugin should should probably hold all params as simple strings. If the calling
control wants the value as a certain type it can explicitly ask when it calls
IPropertyBag::Read

Comment 1

[Adam Lock]

Attachment: Patch

I have verified that Internet Explorer doesn't bother to change the type of
PARAM name/value pairs, leaving them all as strings. This is true for bools,
ints, doubles and presumably more esoteric types too. This patch replicates
that behaviour, removing the code that attempts to cast the value into its
native type and just holds them as string values.

This means controls expecting some large session id number string, e.g.
"0000398247238974234987" cannot be shocked into crashing when they receive a
double or when the double converted to a string loses the original formatting,
e.g. getting back "3.98247238974234987e+17"

Comment 2

[Adam Lock]

Comment on attachment 118655 [details] [diff] [review]
Patch

Requesting r/sr on this simple patch to store PARAM values as strings rather
than try to convert them to other types first.

Comment 3

[David Bradley]

Comment on attachment 118655 [details] [diff] [review]
Patch

r=dbradley

Comment 4

[Alec Flett]

Comment on attachment 118655 [details] [diff] [review]
Patch

that's easy. sr=alecf

Comment 5

[Adam Lock]

Comment on attachment 118655 [details] [diff] [review]
Patch

Requesting 1.4a checkin approval. Simple fix, obvious, activex specific.

Comment 6

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

Comment on attachment 118655 [details] [diff] [review]
Patch

please land first thing in beta. thanks.

Comment 7

[Adam Lock]

Fix is checked in