Bug 149251 Inconsistent Handling of a Non-inheritable ROM Property
For a ROM property defined to be non-inheritable, an empty string property value should be consistently handled as an empty string, not as null. For example, an oda.dataSource extension defines a data source property with canInherit=false. When a oda-data-source handle get saved in a report design, it correctly includes the tag for such property, even when an empty string value is specified. <oda-data-source extensionID="my.oda.plugin" name="my Data Source" id="24"> ... <property name="ApplicationServer"></property> </oda-data-source> However, later when using the DE API to read its property value, a null is returned. Then when the report design is subsequently saved, the property tag is lost. Expects that an empty string value of a non-inhertiable property should be preserved.
model/org.eclipse.birt.report.model/src/org/eclipse/birt/report/model/core/DesignElement.java
if ( e == element )
				return true;
			e = e.container;
		}
		return false;
	}
	/**
	 * Returns the value of a property as a number (BigDecimal).
	 * 
	 * @param module
	 *            the module
	 * @param propName
	 *            the name of the property to get
	 * @return the property as a BigDecimal, or null if the value is not set or
	 *         cannot convert to a number
	 */
	public BigDecimal getNumberProperty( Module module, String propName )
	{
		Object value = getProperty( module, propName );
		if ( value == null )
			return null;
		if ( value instanceof BigDecimal )
			return (BigDecimal) value;
		ElementPropertyDefn prop = getPropertyDefn( propName );
		PropertyType type = MetaDataDictionary.getInstance( ).getPropertyType(
				prop.getTypeCode( ) );
		return type.toNumber( module, value );
	}
	/**
	 * Applies a design visitor. The derived element calls the corresponding