Unexpected Unsaved Changes (Dirty Forms) Issue

Frappe Framework
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1

My Case

I faced an issue where every time I opened a document, the form was marked as unsaved (dirty), even though I hadn’t changed anything manually.

After some debugging, I discovered the cause:
I was setting a value in a field after the form loaded, which automatically made the form dirty.

The Fix

The solution was simple — only set the value if the field is empty (or different from what I want to set).
This way, the form doesn’t get marked as dirty unnecessarily.

What is a Dirty Form?

In Frappe, a Dirty Form means that a document (Doc) opened in the Desk has unsaved changes.
Whenever a field value is modified, Frappe marks the form as “dirty” until it is saved.

This is why:

  • The Save button lights up as soon as you change a field.
  • You may see a warning when trying to leave the page:
    “You have unsaved changes. Do you want to leave without saving?”

When Does the Dirty Form Issue Happen?

Sometimes, the form becomes dirty even if the user hasn’t changed anything manually.
This often happens because of custom scripts or automated updates to fields.

Mostly 99% of time, the form be dirty because of Custom Scripts that set values using frm.set_value().

Solutions to Dirty Form Issues

1. Ignore Dirty Status (Not Recommended for Real Data)

If the change is only UI-related and doesn’t need saving:

frm.dirty = false;

This tells Frappe: “ignore this change”.
Use this carefully, only for visual/UI changes.

2. Auto-Save After Changes

If the value must be stored, you can auto-save programmatically:

frm.save();

3. Best Practice for My Case

When you need to set a value programmatically:

  • Use frm.set_value() only if the field is empty (or if the new value is different from the existing one).
    This avoids marking the form dirty unnecessarily.
if (!frm.doc.my_field) {
    frm.set_value("my_field", "Default Value");
}

// or safer comparison
if (frm.doc.my_field !== "New Value") {
    frm.set_value("my_field", "New Value");
}

Note: Technically, frm.set_value() already checks for equality internally
(it only updates if value != old_value).
However, in practice, adding an explicit check (e.g., if (!frm.doc.fieldname) or comparing old/new values) often works better. idk why!!! but here we go

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