Bug: Native TextEncodeAceStepAudio1.5 node forces strict COMBO values, breaking Ace-Step's auto-metadata feature

### Custom Node Testing

- [x] I have tried disabling custom nodes and the issue persists (see [how to disable custom nodes](https://docs.comfy.org/troubleshooting/custom-node-issues#step-1%3A-test-with-all-custom-nodes-disabled) if you need help)

### Expected Behavior

The dropdown lists for `keyscale`, `language`, and `timesignature` parameters in the native `TextEncodeAceStepAudio1.5` node should include an empty string `""` or an `"auto"` option at the top of the selection list.

When selected, it should pass `None` or an empty string to the underlying model backend, allowing Ace-Step 1.5's native internal language model to automatically infer the musical key, language, and time signature from the prompt text (as designed in the original model architecture).

### Actual Behavior

Currently, these three parameters are hardcoded as strict UI `COMBO` dropdowns with no option to leave them blank. ComfyUI forces the user to manually pick an explicit value for every single run.

Furthermore, if a user tries to automate this node by converting these widgets to inputs (Right-click -> Convert to input) to dynamically bypass them or feed them via a parser, ComfyUI blocks the connection with a rigid type-mismatch error (`STRING` vs `COMBO`). This completely breaks automated LLM/JSON generation pipelines.

### Steps to Reproduce

1. Run ComfyUI (even with `--disable-all-custom-nodes`).
2. Add the native `TextEncodeAceStepAudio1.5` node to the canvas.
3. Look at the `keyscale`, `language`, and `timesignature` dropdowns. Notice there is no way to deselect them or choose an "auto-detect" mode.
4. Right-click on any of these parameters and select "Convert to input".
5. Try to connect a standard string or an empty string primitive to it. The UI blocks the connection due to type-checking.

### Debug Logs

```powershell
[INFO] setup plugin alembic.autogenerate.schemas
[INFO] setup plugin alembic.autogenerate.tables
[INFO] setup plugin alembic.autogenerate.types
[INFO] setup plugin alembic.autogenerate.constraints
[INFO] setup plugin alembic.autogenerate.defaults
[INFO] setup plugin alembic.autogenerate.comments
[START] Security scan
[INFO] [ComfyUI-Manager] Using uv as Python module for pip operations.
[DONE] Security scan
** ComfyUI startup time: 2026-06-20 01:51:40.095
** Platform: Linux
** Python version: 3.13.11 (main, Jan 16 2026, 03:05:42) [GCC 14.3.1 20250801]
** Python executable: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/.venv/bin/python
** ComfyUI Path: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI
** ComfyUI Base Folder Path: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI
** User directory: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/user
** ComfyUI-Manager config path: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/user/__manager/config.ini
** Log path: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/user/comfyui.log
[INFO] [PRE] ComfyUI-Manager
[INFO]
Prestartup times for custom nodes:
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/rgthree-comfy
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-easy-use
[INFO]
[INFO] Found comfy_kitchen backend eager: {'available': True, 'disabled': False, 'unavailable_reason': None, 'capabilities': ['apply_rope', 'apply_rope1', 'apply_rope_split_half', 'apply_rope_split_half1', 'dequantize_mxfp8', 'dequantize_nvfp4', 'dequantize_per_tensor_fp8', 'gemv_awq_w4a16', 'quantize_mxfp8', 'quantize_nvfp4', 'quantize_per_tensor_fp8', 'quantize_svdquant_w4a4', 'scaled_mm_mxfp8', 'scaled_mm_nvfp4', 'scaled_mm_svdquant_w4a4', 'stochastic_rounding_fp8']}
[INFO] Found comfy_kitchen backend cuda: {'available': True, 'disabled': False, 'unavailable_reason': None, 'capabilities': ['apply_rope', 'apply_rope1', 'apply_rope_split_half', 'apply_rope_split_half1', 'dequantize_nvfp4', 'dequantize_per_tensor_fp8', 'gemv_awq_w4a16', 'quantize_mxfp8', 'quantize_nvfp4', 'quantize_per_tensor_fp8', 'quantize_svdquant_w4a4', 'scaled_mm_nvfp4', 'scaled_mm_svdquant_w4a4', 'stochastic_rounding_fp8']}
[INFO] Found comfy_kitchen backend triton: {'available': True, 'disabled': True, 'unavailable_reason': None, 'capabilities': ['apply_rope', 'apply_rope1', 'apply_rope_split_half', 'apply_rope_split_half1', 'dequantize_nvfp4', 'dequantize_per_tensor_fp8', 'quantize_mxfp8', 'quantize_nvfp4', 'quantize_per_tensor_fp8']}
[INFO] Checkpoint files will always be loaded safely.
[INFO] Total VRAM 15840 MB, total RAM 128695 MB
[INFO] pytorch version: 2.13.0.dev20260609+cu132
[INFO] Set vram state to: NORMAL_VRAM
[INFO] Device: cuda:0 NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti : cudaMallocAsync
[INFO] Device: cuda:1 NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti : cudaMallocAsync
[INFO] Using async weight offloading with 2 streams
[INFO] Enabled pinned memory 115825.0
[INFO] Using sage attention
aimdo: /project/src-posix/cuda-funchooks.c:52:DEBUG:aimdo_setup_hooks: hooks successfully installed
aimdo: /project/src/control.c:247:INFO:comfy-aimdo inited for GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti (VRAM: 15839 MB)
aimdo: /project/src/control.c:247:INFO:comfy-aimdo inited for GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti (VRAM: 15836 MB)
[INFO] DynamicVRAM support detected and enabled
[INFO] Python version: 3.13.11 (main, Jan 16 2026, 03:05:42) [GCC 14.3.1 20250801]
[INFO] ComfyUI version: 0.25.0
[INFO] comfy-aimdo version: 0.4.10
[INFO] comfy-kitchen version: 0.2.10
[INFO] comfyui-frontend-package version: 1.45.15
[INFO] comfyui-workflow-templates version: 0.10.0
[INFO] comfyui-embedded-docs version: 0.5.4
[INFO] comfy-kitchen version: 0.2.10
[INFO] comfy-aimdo version: 0.4.10
[INFO] [Prompt Server] web root: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/.venv/lib/python3.13/site-packages/comfyui_frontend_package/static
[INFO] Asset seeder disabled
[INFO] [START] ComfyUI-Manager
[ComfyUI-Manager] Using GitPython backend
[INFO] [ComfyUI-Manager] network_mode: personal_cloud
[WARNING] [ComfyUI-Manager] The matrix sharing feature has been disabled because the `matrix-nio` dependency is not installed.
To use this feature, please run the following command:
/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/.venv/bin/python -m pip install matrix-nio

[INFO] ComfyUI-GGUF: Allowing full torch compile
[WARNING] Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/nodes.py", line 2214, in load_custom_node
module_spec.loader.exec_module(module)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^
File "", line 1023, in exec_module
File "", line 488, in _call_with_frames_removed
File "/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/xdit-comfyui-private/__init__.py", line 1, in
from xdit_comfyui_private import NODE_CLASS_MAPPINGS, NODE_DISPLAY_NAME_MAPPINGS
File "/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/xdit-comfyui-private/xdit_comfyui_private/__init__.py", line 1, in
from .nodes import NODE_CLASS_MAPPINGS, NODE_DISPLAY_NAME_MAPPINGS
File "/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/xdit-comfyui-private/xdit_comfyui_private/nodes.py", line 9, in
from .utils import load_diffusion_model, load_checkpoint_guess_config, any_typ
File "/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/xdit-comfyui-private/xdit_comfyui_private/utils.py", line 11, in
from .executor.executor import FluxExecutor, UNetExecutor
File "/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/xdit-comfyui-private/xdit_comfyui_private/executor/executor.py", line 11, in
from ray.util.placement_group import PlacementGroupSchedulingStrategy
ImportError: cannot import name 'PlacementGroupSchedulingStrategy' from 'ray.util.placement_group' (/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/.venv/lib/python3.13/site-packages/ray/util/placement_group.py)

[WARNING] Cannot import /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/xdit-comfyui-private module for custom nodes: cannot import name 'PlacementGroupSchedulingStrategy' from 'ray.util.placement_group' (/mnt/nier/ComfyUI/.venv/lib/python3.13/site-packages/ray/util/placement_group.py)

Initializing ControlAltAI Nodes
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Installed external sage-attention head_dim=160 noise guard
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Successfully imported MemoryManager from .nodes.memory_manager
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Successfully imported DisTorchPurgeVRAMV2 from .nodes.purge_vram
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Successfully imported PatchSageAttentionDM from .nodes.sa
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Registered MemoryManager node
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Registered DisTorchPurgeVRAMV2 node
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Registered PatchSageAttentionDM node
[ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager] Total registered nodes: ['ModelPatchMemoryCleaner', 'MemoryManager', 'DisTorchPurgeVRAMV2', 'PatchSageAttentionDM']
[VideoHelperSuite] - WARNING - Failed to import imageio_ffmpeg

[rgthree-comfy] Loaded 48 magnificent nodes. 🎉

[rgthree-comfy] ComfyUI's new Node 2.0 rendering may be incompatible with some rgthree-comfy nodes and features, breaking some rendering as well as losing the ability to access a node's properties (a vital part of many nodes). It also appears to run MUCH more slowly spiking CPU usage and causing jankiness and unresponsiveness, especially with large workflows. Personally I am not planning to use the new Nodes 2.0 and, unfortunately, am not able to invest the time to investigate and overhaul rgthree-comfy where needed. If you have issues when Nodes 2.0 is enabled, I'd urge you to switch it off as well and join me in hoping ComfyUI is not planning to deprecate the existing, stable canvas rendering all together.

[INFO] [MultiGPU Core Patching] Patching mm.soft_empty_cache for Comprehensive Memory Management (VRAM + CPU + Store Pruning)
[MultiGPU Core Patching] Patching mm.get_torch_device, mm.text_encoder_device, mm.unet_offload_device
[MultiGPU DEBUG] Initial current_device: cuda:0
[MultiGPU DEBUG] Initial current_text_encoder_device: cuda:0
[MultiGPU DEBUG] Initial current_unet_offload_device: cpu
[MultiGPU] Initiating custom_node Registration. . .
-----------------------------------------------
custom_node Found Nodes
-----------------------------------------------
ComfyUI-LTXVideo N 0
ComfyUI-Florence2 N 0
ComfyUI_bitsandbytes_NF4 N 0
x-flux-comfyui N 0
ComfyUI-MMAudio N 0
ComfyUI-GGUF Y 18
PuLID_ComfyUI N 0
ComfyUI-WanVideoWrapper N 0
-----------------------------------------------
[MultiGPU] Registration complete. Final mappings: CheckpointLoaderAdvancedMultiGPU, CheckpointLoaderAdvancedDisTorch2MultiGPU, UNetLoaderLP, UNETLoaderMultiGPU, VAELoaderMultiGPU, CLIPLoaderMultiGPU, DualCLIPLoaderMultiGPU, TripleCLIPLoaderMultiGPU, QuadrupleCLIPLoaderMultiGPU, CLIPVisionLoaderMultiGPU, CheckpointLoaderSimpleMultiGPU, ControlNetLoaderMultiGPU, DiffusersLoaderMultiGPU, DiffControlNetLoaderMultiGPU, UNETLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, VAELoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, CLIPLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, DualCLIPLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, TripleCLIPLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, QuadrupleCLIPLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, CLIPVisionLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, CheckpointLoaderSimpleDisTorch2MultiGPU, ControlNetLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, DiffusersLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, DiffControlNetLoaderDisTorch2MultiGPU, UnetLoaderGGUFDisTorchMultiGPU, UnetLoaderGGUFAdvancedDisTorchMultiGPU, CLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorchMultiGPU, DualCLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorchMultiGPU, TripleCLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorchMultiGPU, QuadrupleCLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorchMultiGPU, UnetLoaderGGUFDisTorch2MultiGPU, UnetLoaderGGUFAdvancedDisTorch2MultiGPU, CLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorch2MultiGPU, DualCLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorch2MultiGPU, TripleCLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorch2MultiGPU, QuadrupleCLIPLoaderGGUFDisTorch2MultiGPU, UnetLoaderGGUFMultiGPU, UnetLoaderGGUFAdvancedMultiGPU, CLIPLoaderGGUFMultiGPU, DualCLIPLoaderGGUFMultiGPU, TripleCLIPLoaderGGUFMultiGPU, QuadrupleCLIPLoaderGGUFMultiGPU
RYAN ON THE INSIDE - Custom Nodes Loaded
[RyanOnTheInside] Copying extension file: widget_hotkey.js
Checking for AdvancedLivePortrait at: None
Checking for Advanced-ControlNet at: None
Checking for AnimateDiff-Evolved at: None
ComfyUI-AdvancedLivePortrait not found. FlexExpressionEditor will not be available. Install ComfyUI-AdvancedLivePortrait and restart ComfyUI.
ComfyUI-Advanced-ControlNet not found. Advanced-ControlNet feature nodes will not be available. Install ComfyUI-Advanced-ControlNet and restart ComfyUI.
ComfyUI-AnimateDiff-Evolved not found. AnimateDiff feature nodes will not be available. Install ComfyUI-AnimateDiff-Evolved and restart ComfyUI.
[comfyui_ryanontheinside.acestep] [ACE-Step Patches] Patched resolve_areas_and_cond_masks_multidim for 1D latent support
[comfyui_ryanontheinside.acestep] [ACE-Step Patches] Patched comfy.utils.reshape_mask for 1D latent support
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Added path mapping: /mnt/nier/mod/loras -> /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/loras
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Found LoRA roots:
- /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/loras
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Added path mapping: /mnt/nier/mod/checkpoints -> /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/checkpoints
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Added path mapping: /mnt/nier/mod/diffusion_models -> /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/diffusion_models
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Added path mapping: /mnt/nier/mod/unet -> /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/unet
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Found checkpoint roots:
- /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/checkpoints
- /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/diffusion_models
- /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/unet
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Added path mapping: /mnt/nier/mod/embeddings -> /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/embeddings
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Found embedding roots:
- /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/models/embeddings
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Symlink cache loaded with 0 mappings
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Symlink mappings restored from cache in 0.60 ms
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Updated 'comfyui' library with current folder paths
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Detected async ComfyUI execution, installing async metadata hooks
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Metadata collection hooks installed for runtime values
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] ComfyUI Metadata Collector initialized
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Example images path:
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Added static route for locales: /locales -> /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-lora-manager/locales
🔧 torchaudio.save/load globally patched (scipy for WAV files, no TorchCodec)
🔇 Suppressed torchaudio 2.9 migration warnings
ℹ Critical package versions: NumPy 2.4.6, Librosa 0.11.0, Numba 0.65.1, PyTorch 2.13.0.dev20260609+cu132, TorchAudio 2.11.0.dev20260610+cu132, Transformers 5.10.0.dev0, Accelerate 1.13.0, SoundFile 0.14.0
⚠ Transformers 5.x detected: Qwen3-TTS tokenizer is incompatible.
Please downgrade to transformers<=4.57.3 (see requirements.txt).
❌ Vocal/Noise Removal failed: No module named 'audio_separator'
======================================================================
🚀 TTS Audio Suite v4.27.3
Universal multi-engine TTS extension for ComfyUI
🐍 Python 3.13.11 detected
✅ TTS Audio Suite v4.27.3 loaded with 47 nodes:
• ⚙ ChatterBox Official 23-Lang Engine
• ⚙ ChatterBox TTS Engine
• ⚙ CosyVoice3 Engine
• ⚙ Echo-TTS Engine
• ⚙ F5 TTS Engine
• ⚙ Granite ASR Engine
• ⚙ Higgs Audio 2 Engine
• ⚙ IndexTTS-2 Engine
• ⚙ MOSS-TTS Engine
• ⚙ Qwen3-TTS Engine
• ⚙ RVC Engine
• ⚙ Step Audio EditX Engine
• ⚙ VibeVoice Engine
• ♻ Refresh Voice Cache
• ✏ ASR Transcribe
• 🌈 IndexTTS-2 Emotion Vectors
• 🌈 IndexTTS-2 Text Emotion
• 🌊 Audio Wave Analyzer
• 🎓 Model Training
• 🎙 Voice Capture
• 🎛 MOSS Training Config
• 🎛 RVC Training Config
• 🎞 MOSS Clip Staging
• 🎤 TTS Text
• 🎨 Qwen3-TTS Voice Designer
• 🎨 Step Audio EditX - Audio Editor
• 🎭 Character Voices
• 🎭 Load RVC Character Model
• 🏷 Multiline TTS Tag Editor
• 👄 F5-TTS Speech Editor
• 📝 ASR Punctuation / Truecase
• 📝 MOSS Manifest Builder
• 📝 Phoneme Text Normalizer
• 📦 MOSS Dataset Prep
• 📦 RVC Dataset Prep
• 📺 TTS SRT
• 📺 Text to SRT Builder
• 🔄 Voice Changer
• 🔧 Audio Analyzer Options
• 🔧 F5-TTS Edit Options
• 🔧 RVC Pitch Extraction Options
• 🔧 SRT Advanced Options
• 🔧 Viseme Mouth Shape Options
• 🗣 Silent Speech Analyzer
• 🤐 Voice Fixer
• 🥪 Merge Audio
• 🧾 MOSS Dataset Rows
======================================================================
[TTS Audio Suite] 🎭 Character voices: Found 27 characters, 10 aliases (cached)
[TTS Audio Suite] 🔄 Updating character discovery in background...
[ComfyUI-Easy-Use] server: v1.3.6 Loaded
[ComfyUI-Easy-Use] web root: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-easy-use/web_version/v2 Loaded
[INFO]
Import times for custom nodes:
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/websocket_image_save.py
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/audio-separation-nodes-comfyui
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-custom-scripts
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/controlaltai-nodes
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/sd-perturbed-attention
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-videohelpersuite
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/rgthree-comfy
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/gguf
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/ComfyUI-DistorchMemoryManager
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-kjnodes
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/ComfyUI-GGUF
[INFO] 0.0 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-ollama
[INFO] 0.1 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-multigpu
[INFO] 0.1 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/ComfyUI-UVR5
[INFO] 0.1 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/tts_audio_suite
[INFO] 0.1 seconds (IMPORT FAILED): /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/xdit-comfyui-private
[INFO] 0.3 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui_ryanonyheinside
[INFO] 0.4 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-lora-manager
[INFO] 1.1 seconds: /mnt/nier/ComfyUI/custom_nodes/comfyui-easy-use
[INFO]
[INFO] Context impl SQLiteImpl.
[INFO] Will assume non-transactional DDL.
[INFO] Using RAM pressure cache.
[INFO] Starting server

[INFO] To see the GUI go to: http://0.0.0.0:8188
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Recipe cache miss: performing full directory scan
[WARNING] [LoRA-Manager] Duplicate filename conflict detected: 299 lora filename(s) are shared by 598 files total, causing ambiguity in Lora resolution. Open the Doctor panel to resolve one-click.
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Lora cache hydrated from persisted snapshot with 100 models
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Recipe cache initialized in 0.03 seconds. Found 0 recipes
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Checkpoint cache hydrated from persisted snapshot with 24 models
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] Embedding cache initialized in 0.00 seconds. Found 0 models
[INFO] [LoRA-Manager] FTS index validated, reusing existing index with 0 recipes
📋 System Dependencies (background check):
⚠ Engine dependencies missing:
ChatterBox TTS:
• s3tokenizer (import: s3tokenizer)
F5-TTS:
• cached-path (import: cached_path)
Higgs Audio 2:
• descript-audio-codec (import: dac)
• vector-quantize-pytorch (import: vector_quantize_pytorch)
• dacite (import: dacite)
RVC Voice Conversion:
• faiss-cpu (import: faiss)
• torchcrepe (import: torchcrepe)
🔧 Fix: pip install -r requirements.txt
ℹ Engine nodes will fail without dependencies
```

### Other

This is a critical oversight in the native audio-stack implementation. Forcing strict metadata selection directly contradicts the Core-of-Thought planner capabilities of the Ace-Step 1.5 model, turning an automated AI feature into an annoying manual chore.

Start at the native TextEncodeAceStepAudio1.5 node and trace how its keyscale, language, and timesignature parameters are exposed to the UI and passed to the model backend. Reproduce the missing empty or auto option and the STRING-versus-COMBO connection failure; done means these parameters can be left for automatic inference and accept the intended automated input without breaking existing use.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.