[ProjectController] fix the sorting of project entities for node v11+

[das7pad]

Description

TL;DR: The array sorting algorithm has changed in node v11, which is breaking a single unit test.

The patch is backwards compatible, see below.

Background and Demo

For the signature Array.prototype.sort((a, b) => rt)
rt encodes the sorting positions as follows [1]:

• rt < 0: a should go first
• rt = 0: same position
• rt > 0: b should go first

Node version 11 bundles an updated v8 engine [2]. One of the changes is
a different sorting algorithm for Array.prototype.sort.
Quicksort was replaced by Timsort[3], a stable sorting algorithm.
Node v12 (new LTS) has the same updated behaviour.

For an arbitrary sorted array every comparision would yield 0 or 1.
Our comparision function using rt = a > b, is not sufficient anymore,
as it would yield the signature of a sorted array and no changes are
made to the sequence accordingly.
The fix is simple: adjust the return value of 0 to -1.

There should be only one entity per unique path, so we can omit the rt=0
case.

Here is a minimal demo of the unit test

test/unit/src/Project/ProjectControllerTests.js
"ProjectController"
-> "projectEntitiesJson"
-> "should produce a list of entities"

For future reference I kept the nvm output referencing the used node
version (Running node ...) in place.

Using the current sorting function

$ nvm run v10 -e 'console.log(
[{ path: "/things/b.txt", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/main.tex", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/things/a.txt", type: "file" }
].sort((a, b) => {
  const rt = a.path > b.path
  console.log("comparing", a.path, b.path, rt)
  return rt}))'
Running node v10.17.0 (npm v6.12.1)
comparing /things/b.txt /main.tex true
comparing /things/b.txt /things/a.txt true
comparing /main.tex /things/a.txt false
[ { path: '/main.tex', type: 'doc' },
  { path: '/things/a.txt', type: 'file' },
  { path: '/things/b.txt', type: 'doc' } ]

$ nvm run v11 -e 'console.log(
[{ path: "/things/b.txt", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/main.tex", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/things/a.txt", type: "file" }
].sort((a, b) => {
  const rt = a.path > b.path
  console.log("comparing", a.path, b.path, rt)
  return rt}))'
Running node v11.15.0 (npm v6.12.1)
comparing /main.tex /things/b.txt false
comparing /things/a.txt /main.tex true
[ { path: '/things/b.txt', type: 'doc' },
  { path: '/main.tex', type: 'doc' },
  { path: '/things/a.txt', type: 'file' } ]

Using the adjusted return value

$ nvm run v10 -e 'console.log(
[{ path: "/things/b.txt", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/main.tex", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/things/a.txt", type: "file" }
].sort((a, b) => {
  const rt = a.path > b.path ? 1 : -1
  console.log("comparing", a.path, b.path, rt)
  return rt}))'
Running node v10.17.0 (npm v6.12.1)
comparing /things/b.txt /main.tex 1
comparing /things/b.txt /things/a.txt 1
comparing /main.tex /things/a.txt -1
[ { path: '/main.tex', type: 'doc' },
  { path: '/things/a.txt', type: 'file' },
  { path: '/things/b.txt', type: 'doc' } ]

$ nvm run v11 -e 'console.log(
[{ path: "/things/b.txt", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/main.tex", type: "doc" },
 { path: "/things/a.txt", type: "file" }
].sort((a, b) => {
  const rt = a.path > b.path ? 1 : -1
  console.log("comparing", a.path, b.path, rt)
  return rt}))'
Running node v11.15.0 (npm v6.12.1)
comparing /main.tex /things/b.txt -1
comparing /things/a.txt /main.tex 1
comparing /things/a.txt /things/b.txt -1
comparing /things/a.txt /main.tex 1
[ { path: '/main.tex', type: 'doc' },
  { path: '/things/a.txt', type: 'file' },
  { path: '/things/b.txt', type: 'doc' } ]

---

[1] https://developer.mozilla.org/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Array/sort#Description
[2] nodejs/node#22754
[3] https://chromium-review.googlesource.com/c/v8/v8/+/1186801

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Screenshots

Related Issues / PRs

Review

Potential Impact

Likely none, no acceptance tests are impacted.

Manual Testing Performed

Accessibility

Deployment

Deployment Checklist

Metrics and Monitoring

Who Needs to Know?

[das7pad]

Imported in 27e1a4b