New workflow with datalad?

[Peter N. Steinmetz]

With the current use of datalad for the testing data in the ephy_testing_data gin repository has the workflow for adding new testing data changes? The prior instructions are for using gin, git, and git-annex.

[Yaroslav Halchenko]

FWIW datalad adds little to no magic, so likely you could still accomplish everything with pure git and git-annex as before. But indeed might make sense to update instructions  --could you point me to them?

[Peter N. Steinmetz]

Hi Yaroslav,

Yes, the contribution guidelines are now on the g-node site at https://gin.g-node.org/NeuralEnsemble/ephy_testing_data in the README.md file. 

I think an update would be very helpful. In the past few years I have noticed that the test data often causes significant delays in contributions for Neo and may deter people from doing so. 

I think it would be important to not only provide specific steps to contribute, but also to explain the following items -

How and where the local copy of the repository is created when running tests. 

The relationship between datalad, gin, git, git-annex. 

How an account at g-node is related to the main repository and the creation of pull requests. 

As a person who routinely uses python and git, I find the present arrangements for this repository somewhat confusing, especially as related to forking my own copy of a repository at github. 

I am happy to assist with reading and commenting on any revisions of the guideline. 

cheers,

Peter

[Peter N. Steinmetz]

I have been studying this a bit more. It is still not clear to me whether I am supposed to be working on my own fork to make changes, or if I should make changes into the default ephy_testing_data which gets installed now into my home directory. 

I would suggest that when the guidelines are updated they address how to make contributions using either datalad, gin, or git-annex. 

[Samuel Garcia]

HI Peter,
we use datalad as downloader inside python-neo and also spikeinterface for testing suite.
This allow to download only new files.

For pushing new files in the repo at gin-gnode we still use the gin command.
So you must install it on your machine.

And also very important, forks do not works with git-annex so anyone need to clone the main repo  and make an internal PR from an internal branch.
I think you are already in the collaborator list.

I think it would be feasible to change the main way of contributing with with a datalad command. instead of gin command.
I think we were too lazy to try it!


Have a nice day.

Sam

On 14/02/2024 20:57, Peter N. Steinmetz wrote:

With the current use of datalad for the testing data in the ephy_testing_data gin repository has the workflow for adding new testing data changes? The prior instructions are for using gin, git, and git-annex. --
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[Peter N. Steinmetz]

I just checked this out and one can use gin inside the ephy_testing_data copy which is created by datalad while running the tests. 

In the updated documentation it will be useful to clarify that git-annex, gin, and datalad are all different commands for working on the same underlying git-annex repository, which is a special form of a git repository. 

Peter