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
* @param base
	 *            The new parent element, or null if the element is to have no
	 *            base element.
	 */
	public void setExtendsElement( DesignElement base )
	{
		DesignElement oldExtends = getExtendsElement( );
		if ( base == oldExtends && base != null )
			return;
		if ( oldExtends != null )
			oldExtends.dropDerived( this );
		if ( base == null )
		{
			extendsRef = null;
		}
		else
		{
			
			assert base.getDefn( ) == getDefn( );
			
			assert base.getName( ) != null;
			String namespace = null;
			Module root = base.getRoot( );
			if ( root instanceof Library )
			{
				namespace = ( (Library) root ).getNamespace( );
			}
			extendsRef = new ElementRefValue( namespace, base );
			base.addDerived( this );
		}