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feat: pdf editor authoring flag#38148

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Kelketek wants to merge 1 commit intoopenedx:masterfrom
open-craft:fox/pdf-editor
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feat: pdf editor authoring flag#38148
Kelketek wants to merge 1 commit intoopenedx:masterfrom
open-craft:fox/pdf-editor

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@Kelketek Kelketek commented Mar 10, 2026 •
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Description

This merge request adds a waffle flag for toggling the new PDF editor in the authoring MFE, and also signals to the authoring frontend to use the new interface as applicable.

Supporting information

This is part of https://openedx.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/OEPM/pages/5335908397/Proposal+Add+PDF+Block+to+Base+Installation

Testing instructions

  1. Set up this branch of xblocks-contrib to get an MFE editing-compatible version of the PDF Block
  2. Set up this branch of frontend-authoring to get the PDF editing tool in the MFE
  3. Add "pdf" to your list of advanced modules for a course in studio
  4. Add a PDF block and customize it.
  5. Save the block
  6. Use the edit button to edit the block settings.
  7. Add the waffle flag legacy_studio.pdf_editor and set it to enabled globally.
  8. Refresh the unit authoring page and hit the edit button on the XBlock. The old authoring interface should appear.

Dependencies

Must be merged BEFORE THIS PR: openedx/frontend-app-authoring#2916
Must be merged BEFORE THIS PR: openedx/xblocks-contrib#193

Deadline

Must be merged in time for Verawood

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openedx-webhooks commented Mar 10, 2026 •
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Thanks for the pull request, @Kelketek!

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@openedx-webhooks openedx-webhooks added open-source-contribution PR author is not from Axim or 2U core contributor PR author is a Core Contributor (who may or may not have write access to this repo). labels Mar 10, 2026
@github-project-automation github-project-automation bot moved this to Needs Triage in Contributions Mar 10, 2026
@mphilbrick211 mphilbrick211 moved this from Needs Triage to Waiting on Author in Contributions Mar 11, 2026
@Kelketek Kelketek mentioned this pull request Mar 12, 2026
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@Kelketek Kelketek marked this pull request as ready for review March 12, 2026 19:06
@samuelallan72
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samuelallan72 commented Mar 13, 2026

@Kelketek I did try turning this flag on, but I still see the new editor in authoring. :/ I'm in the authoring mfe on the dev server, and when it requests course waffle flags, I see use_new_pdf_editor: false in the response.

By the way, is a flag here necessary? This means more configuration, and we need to maintain two editor frontends for the pdf xblock. Are there other use cases? The one in the comment is about using a custom pdf xblock, but if you use a custom block, you should also be using a different identifier (ie. not 'pdf'), so it won't have that problem.

@samuelallan72 samuelallan72 mentioned this pull request Mar 13, 2026
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@Kelketek
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Kelketek commented Mar 13, 2026 •
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@samuelallan72 I figured out what I did wrong. It should work now.

By the way, is a flag here necessary? This means more configuration, and we need to maintain two editor frontends for the pdf xblock. Are there other use cases? The one in the comment is about using a custom pdf xblock, but if you use a custom block, you should also be using a different identifier (ie. not 'pdf'), so it won't have that problem.

The main one is the custom PDF block. The PDF block was pulled in from open source contribution, and there are many forks out there. While most seemed like they should be compatible out of the gate, there are two problems:

  1. We KNOW of one team that has customizations that wouldn't be compatible and rely on the old interface, and they're a client of ours. We plan to upstream these eventually but that product proposal has not yet been written.
  2. We don't know who else customized the interface, and there are some forks that have additional fields that they'd lose the ability to edit if they couldn't use the traditional editor. We can't know whether or not they're in active use.

If we fix 1 and no one comes out of the woodwork for 2, we might eventually remove the toggle entirely. But for now we don't have enough info.

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