Calling redraw clears inputlist() choices

[lithammer]

Problem

When redraw is called async(?), it will clear the choices presented by inputlist().

Before redraw:

After:

Some related issues:

• Asynchronous code can mess with inputlist vim/vim#1843
• smear_to_cmd breaks z= (spell suggestions) and similar sphamba/smear-cursor.nvim#82 (originally reported)

Steps to reproduce

nvim --clean --noplugin
:lua vim.defer_fn(vim.cmd.redraw, 5000)
:call inputlist(['Select color:', '1. red', '2. green', '3. blue'])

Wait for the deferred redraw to kick in. Seems to be the same for Vim using timer_start except worse (everything just goes blank).

Expected behavior

I expect the choices to still be present after redraw.

Nvim version (nvim -v)

v0.11.0-dev-1557+ga78eddd541-Homebrew

Vim (not Nvim) behaves the same?

9.1.1000

Operating system/version

macOS 15.1.1

Terminal name/version

Ghostty 72d08552

$TERM environment variable

xterm-ghostty

Installation

Homebrew (brew install --head neovim)

[luukvbaal]

Semi-regression from #31525; same issue was already present for input(). Issue is not present with the proposed default ext_ui in #27855. Not easily solvable for the message grid, can try if we must. "Workaround" would be of course not to redraw (when is redrawing in cmdline mode useful?).

[lithammer]

"Workaround" would be of course not to redraw

It's how I solved it for now (i.e. set smear_to_cmd = false in smear-cursor.nvim).

when is redrawing in cmdline mode useful?

Seems to be needed to animate the cursor when it's moved to the cmdline, see sphamba/smear-cursor.nvim#82 (comment).