Custom importers do not work with singletons

[GammaGames]

Tested versions

• 4.5.1, 4.6

But I also wonder if it's related to abarichello/godot-ci#150, which was present in 4.1

System information

Godot v4.6.stable - Windows 10 (build 19045) - Multi-window, 1 monitor - Vulkan (Forward+) - dedicated AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT (Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.; 32.0.21013.1000) - AMD Ryzen 5 3600 6-Core Processor (12 threads) - 31.93 GiB memory

Issue description

I'm getting an error initially importing resources that have a custom importer in a singleton. I have some csv files set to load with the csv data importer addon:

I opened the .import file to make sure the importer was enabled and noticed a path in the .godot folder:

[remap]
importer="com.timothyqiu.godot-csv-importer"
type="Resource"
uid="uid://bd32ynsmpqx33"
path="res://.godot/imported/singleton_data.csv-1db633ec39e81e98ec83fe69f840e486.res"

[deps]
source_file="res://scene_data.csv"
dest_files=["res://.godot/imported/singleton_data.csv-1db633ec39e81e98ec83fe69f840e486.res"]

[params]
delimiter=0
headers=true
detect_numbers=true
force_float=false

Deleting res://.godot/imported/singleton_data.csv-1db633ec39e81e98ec83fe69f840e486.res (and .ctex file) causes the file to revert to translation on editor restart. Resources preloaded in a regular scene-level script do not have this issue, but this has been a complete blocker in setting up ci builds for my project.

Steps to reproduce

1. Set a resource to use a custom importer
2. Add a global script that preloads the file
3. Delete the related files from .godot/imported
4. Chaos

2026-01-29.23-11-57.-.Trim.1.mp4

Minimal reproduction project (MRP)

mrp.zip

[ydeltastar]

This is because autoloads are initialized before addons. The preload triggers a reimport when the imported file is missing but the importer addon hasn't loaded yet so it fallback to the default one.

godot/editor/file_system/editor_file_system.cpp

Lines 341 to 348 in 80a4af1

	// Now that all the global class names should be loaded, create autoloads and plugins.
	// This is done after loading the global class names because autoloads and plugins can use
	// global class names.
	ep.step(TTR("Creating autoload scripts..."), 3, true);
	ProjectSettingsEditor::get_singleton()->init_autoloads();
	ep.step(TTR("Initializing plugins..."), 4, true);
	EditorNode::get_singleton()->init_plugins();

This order is strange since autoloads are more likely to rely on addons than the other way around.

Doesn't look like there is a good reason for this order. Even a tool autoload doesn't run any code until the addons are added and ready in the editor but since preload() has effects during loading/parsing of the autoload script, it causes this issue.

I have the order reversed in my custom build and it solved my issues with preloads in autoloads and addons.

[GammaGames]

Thank you for confirming! I thought it was something with project loading order but don't know enough to figure out where