Changes to library but we didn't do anything

Hi, ​@Yoki Tyas. I can see why this is frustrating, particularly after doing a lot of troubleshooting. 

Just to clarify, even after you publish all changes, you continue to keep seeing more changes to publish? I’ve created a ticket for you so our Technical Quality team can investigate, but I wanted to clarify that point as a separate issue in addition to the unexpected changes.

You should get an email shortly from me, and I recommend replying to that with any additional information. In particular, it would be helpful if you provide file links to your design file and library, along with sharing those with support-share@figma.com with view access (this won’t affect your billing). Thanks so much for your patience!

Thanks for the response ​@adamsmasher 

Yes, I've noticed that it mostly happens with the same components.
I received your email and will share more detailed information there.

​@adamsmasher I’m seeing the same thing. I’ve noticed it for some time now, very confusing and worrisome as (you know) we treat our Libraries with special care because unnecessary changes impact a LOT of teams/files.

Here’s steps to reproduce. I’m on version 126.6.9 on Mac Desktop, but have seen this for several prior versions/months.

• View Assets panel > “Book” icon / Manage Libraries — See that there is nothing needing publishing (no Modified’s, no Added’s)
• Create branch named “Alert”
• In the new branch, I can verify there is no changes needing to be merged — i.e. it’s still clean
• I create a new component
  • This is a brand new component, let’s say “Alert”
  • My new Alert component consumes my file’s type styles, color styles, and a singular component from this file (my base Icon component)
  • No other components consume my new Alert component
• I begin merging back my new Alert component
  • In “Review and merge changes” I see my expected changes just in my singular artboard and singular component and ⛔️ I see unexpected changes in “Other” (see notes below)
  • I go back to main branch
  • I go back to Alert branch (this is a workaround, see below) — now I only see my expected changes just in my singular artboard and singular component
  • I merge
• Merge completes, I’m back in my main branch
• I go to my Assets panel > “Book” icon / Manage Libraries to publish my new Alert component
  • Expected: I see my new component Alert ready to be published as “Added”
  • ⛔️ I see 14 other components as “Modified” — I didn’t change them, I didn’t alter them, I have no idea why these are needing re-publishing
  • I re-publish them all because I want to keep my library “clean”, but when consuming files pull in this new change it’s not obvious at all what has changed.

Problem #2 — Mystery Changes in “Other”
Mentioned above, but maybe it’s related. I see it’s worse when components use Slots, but it’s also when a component doesn’t use Slots.

• Go through normal branch process — create branch, go to new branch, see it’s still “clean”, create new component, begin merge
• Some times, version A
  • In “Review and merge changes” I see my expected changes and ⛔️ I see unexpected changes in “Other”
    • I have no idea where these are — they aren’t changes I made, I have no artboard, component, or item called “Other”
  • I go back to main branch
  • I go back to feature branch (this is a workaround that I’ve noticed sometimes removes these changes) — now I only see my expected changes just in my singular artboard and singular component
  • I merge, but ⛔️ lots of untouched things are “Modified”
• Other times, version B
  • In “Review and merge changes” I see my expected changes and ⛔️ I see unexpected changes in “Other”
  • I go back to main branch
  • I go back to feature branch trying my workaround — ⛔️ instead this time the changes in “Other” are different, no pattern as to why, but they’re still there and I can’t go to them
  • I merge because I have to, and as you might expect ⛔️ lots of untouched things are “Modified”

Happy to screenshare if that’s helpful to the Figma team

Thanks for the detailed breakdown of the issue, ​@JK_Ryan - I can definitely understand why it’s confusing and worrisome.

Since you provided a really thorough description (particularly in noting the “mystery changes in Other”), I created a ticket with our Technical Quality team and included all of this in with the ticket. You should get that via email from me shortly, and you’re welcome to reply to that with any file links or other information that seems relevant. One additional question - you mentioned seeing this with the desktop app. Do you see this with the browser, too? I’m not sure it makes a difference, but it’s good to know either way. Thank you, and thanks for your patience!

Hi, we’re also running into this same issue. From what we can tell, it seems to be the following problem:

Let’s say I have Assets A, B and C under a Component X. These assets are being used in multiple different Components R, S and T. If I create a new Asset D under Component X, then I end up needing to publish updates to Components R, S and T which weren’t impacted by creating Asset D. This happens on both the browser and desktop app.

Hey ​@Dilsher Ahmed, thanks for chiming in here and braking down your specific issue! 

I understand how this must be disrupting your workflow. When something is published, Figma evaluates changes at the set level rather than the individual asset level. If a variable, style, or low-level component in a set is touched, everything that depends on that set (even transitively) gets marked as modified and becomes eligible to republish. That can cascade into a lot of components you never opened. To dig into your specific case, I have a few questions:

• When you publish those unexpected changes, do R, S, and T stay clean afterward, or do they keep reappearing?
• Are branches involved anywhere in your flow? A few folks here have seen this concentrated around merges.
• Roughly how many assets get flagged versus how many you actually touched?

With these details, we can help connect your with our technical quality team as well. 

​@djv 

To answer your questions.

R, S and T all get changed repeatedly. Basically, if we have something like a color palette and we introduce a new color to it then every single component that uses a color from that palette will require updating regardless of it using the new color.

We are not using branches for this at all.

Most of the assets in our entire projects end up requiring updates when we change these low-level components. A new color means updating the project in its entirety every single time

Hi @Dilsher Ahmed, thanks for the additional context! 
 

The color palette framing is very helpful. What you're describing (adding one variable to a collection, and every component consuming any variable from that collection needing a republish) isn't how this is expected to work. Figma did behave that way at one point, bumping a whole collection whenever any single variable in it changed, but that was changed specifically because of how much noise it created for exactly the reason you're hitting. Adding a new color shouldn't touch components that don't use it.

With branches ruled out, I’d love to connect you with our technical quality team to keep troubleshooting. Two last questions :

• Is the palette in the same file as your components, or a separate library file the component library subscribes to?
• Are your components bound to the palette variables directly, or through a semantic/alias layer in between?

If you’re also able to share a URL link to the library file with Can view access to support-share@figma.com, we can open a ticket. 

To be specific in our case, we have an icons section which we add new icons to occasionally and it updates every single component in the same file. We have several different pages for different base components e.g. inputs etc. and any component that uses any icon will always need to be re-published if we add any new icon etc.

Not sure, what you mean by the second question.

We can share a .fig file with a minimum reproduction case. Could you give me some reference number for the email so the file doesn’t just get lost? Thanks!

Hey, ​@Dilsher Ahmed 👋 Stepping in for my teammate ​@djv 🤩 

On sharing: no need to send us a file. What we're asking for is a link to the library file with support-share@figma.com invited as a viewer. Adding support as a viewer won't affect your billing or take up a seat on your team. That's what support will ask for anyway, so doing it up front front-loads your case and cuts down the back and forth.

On the reference number: once you confirm view access is added, we'll open the ticket for you and you'll get the ticket number in the confirmation email

On the second question: when a component has a color applied, is it pointing straight at a variable like color/blue/500, or at something like surface/primary that then points at color/blue/500? One hop or two.

One thing to separate out: what you described is about icons — adding a new icon and every component that uses an icon needing a republish. The questions above were about your color palette and variables. Im curios if this is the same problem showing up in two places, or two separate things?

As soon as you confirm View access is shared with the support address above, we’ll get the ticket open. Talk soon! –Jaycee