SFDX replacements: not able to replace with blank value

[benben-user]

Im using the replacements feature, all work as expected only issue i cannot replace some text with blank value.

My use case is to replace NameSpace prefix with blank in order to deploy my code to another environment that do not have NameSpace .

Here is an example :

"replacements": [
    {
      "filename": "/force-app/main/default/classes/myHelper.cls",
      "stringToReplace": "myNS__",
      "replaceWithEnv": "BLANK"
    }
  ]

.env
BLANK =

My cli commend is
dotenv -e .env sfdx force source push

which results with :

 Component conversion failed: "BLANK" is in sfdx-project.json as a value for "replaceWithEnv" property, but it's not set in your environment.

[github-actions]

Thank you for filing this issue. We appreciate your feedback and will review the issue as soon as possible. Remember, however, that GitHub isn't a mechanism for receiving support under any agreement or SLA. If you require immediate assistance, contact Salesforce Customer Support.

[mshanemc]

oh, interesting. Would an empty string '' work?

[pgonzaleznetwork]

@mshanemc I'm not the OP but I can confirm this works with a string that contains a space, like this

export HAPPY_SOUP_URL=' '

However, if it's a real entry empty string, like this

export HAPPY_SOUP_URL=' '

The command fails with

Error (1): Component conversion failed: "HAPPY_SOUP_URL" is in sfdx-project.json as a value for "replaceWithEnv" property, but it's not set in your environment.

[benben-user]

oh, interesting. Would an empty string '' work?

Well not for my (Mac).
Also my use case is to replace NS__ so a space will not do the job.
I guess we can use some CONSTE like __BLANK__ and the code (sfdx) will use "" as the replacement and not consider that as an empty env parameter

[mshanemc]

ugh. The downside of changing this would be making it hard to detect the very real mistake of missing envs, which seems backward.

The "cleanest" thing might be to have a new json prop in the replacements to make it clear you want to remove the matched value.

[github-actions]

Thank you for filing this feature request. We appreciate your feedback and will review the feature at our next grooming or sprint planning session. We prioritize feature requests with more upvotes and comments.

[git2gus]

This issue has been linked to a new work item: W-13047969

[shetzel]

I'm on a mac using zsh and both of these worked for me in replacements:

1. export BLANK='' (empty string)
2. export BLANK= (pretty sure zsh also sets this to an empty string)

Maybe this is specific to the shell? Regardless, the fix will resolve an env var that is not found as an empty string (when explicitly set in the replacements section)

[shetzel]

This is now in the latest CLIs: sfdx 7.208.10 / sf 1.85.8