fix: Deleting last block in column

[matthewlipski]

Summary

Currently, when there is only one block in a column, removing it via removeBlocks/replaceBlocks won't collapse the column as it should, leading to confusing UX when deleting the block from the side menu. This behavior is also different to removing the block by hitting backspace at its start.

This PR makes empty columns, and columnLists with <2 children get collapsed. This happens by running the new fixColumnList function in removeBlocks/replaceBlocks. The Backspace keyboard handler has also been updated to use fixColumnList when removing the last block in a column.

Closes #1323
Fixes #2000

Rationale

The current behavior of the remove block button in the side menu is unintuitive when used on the only block in a column, and should be improved.

Changes

• Added fixColumnList function.
• Made removeAndInsertBlocks and Backspace keyboard handler use fixColumnList.

Impact

Since removeAndInsertBlocks can now remove column/columnList nodes that it's actively traversing in doc.descendants, there's an edge case where I'm not sure what will happen.

E.g. consider this structure:

• columnList
  • column
    • blockContainer 1
  • column
    • blockContainer 2
  • column
    • blockContainer 3

If we call removeBlocks for both blockContainer 2 & 3, I'm not sure this will work properly. Worth adding tests for this?

EDIT: Added tests, works ok for both removing and replacing blocks 👍

Testing

See above.

Screenshots/Video

N/A

Checklist

• Code follows the project's coding standards.
• Unit tests covering the new feature have been added.
• All existing tests pass.
• The documentation has been updated to reflect the new feature

Additional Notes

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Project	Deployment	Preview	Updated (UTC)
blocknote	Ready	Preview	Oct 31, 2025 4:59pm
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commit: 4ff328f

[nperez0111]

Where are we at with this @matthewlipski, am I missing the changes you made here?

[matthewlipski]

Nope, #2113 merges into this PR though - do we wanna close this one and merge #2113 straight into main instead?

[nperez0111]

That's what it was. Let's merge that into this & review altogether I think

[matthewlipski]

IMPORTANT NOTE

There is a known issue with this PR, in that fixColumnList will remove all empty columns from a columnList (i.e. ones which only have a single empty paragraph). This is because we want to remove any empty columns that ProseMirror adds when it tries to "fix" columnLists that don't conform to the schema, and we don't differentiate between these and empty columns intentionally created by the user. This can result in poor UX as below:

Screen.Recording.2025-10-31.at.16.27.16.mov