Custom fields, orders and children

[Kuubs]

With the new Virtuemart version 4.0.22 the custom fields are changed yet again, without any documentation.

The orders that are made with custom fields values are stored not in plain text but a reference to a custom field value in the database.

The problems arise when you want to disable custom fields. You cannot remove the custom fields, because when you remove a custom field, you will also remove it's database reference, which makes the order incomplete!

Now in the past versions we could somehow avoid this issue by disabling the custom fields (via phpmyadmin because for some reason it is not in the GUI) but now when I disable custom fields they act like they are removed, and thus there is NO OPTION ANYMORE TO DISABLE CUSTOM FIELDS WITHOUT SCREWING YOUR ORDERS.

Can we please just change how these custom fields work because it's a big mess.

The easiest and best solution would be to HARD STORE the values of the custom fields with the order. I somewhat understand the route that is taken now, but it gives so much room for error, and especiually with orders made you don't want anything to be not trustable.

Can we please make this A PRIORITY because this is a major issue. Virtuemart works great, but custom fields and their orders are a big mess. Can we prioritize to fix this.

EDIT: Ok I think I solved it by using phpmyadmin to disable the parent product custom field. This way the field will be disabled through all children. I dread the day I will have to disable child product specific custom fields...