Follow Up for Sample Sheets (Tracking Issue)

[jmchilton]

For 25.1 (Blocking)

• Column definition validation errors - backend should prevent these from being persisted. Must be in before 25.1 is released I would say. (Validate sample sheet column definitions in workflow definitions on backend. #20880 is ready for review)
• Fix optional numeric columns (Fix optional numeric column definitions for sample sheets. #20830 is ready for review)

For 25.1 Ideally (Non-blocking)

• Add visual indication optional input is okay in columns.
• Have a way to view sample sheets (Implement bare-bones view of sample sheet collections as sheet. #20798 is ready for review)
• Can only add the columns by index in the apply rules tool - "It'd be really a lot easier to work with if I could see the column names (and maybe descriptions), plus an option to add all of them ?"
• Summarize issues with validation in external apps - these are messy and each app does it differently and to different degrees.

Potentially Longer Term Projects

• Collection type input sort of sucks - sample sheet into a new input and updated issue Add a dedicated interface for collection types in Workflow input field #19049.
• Various issues with keyboard input and AG Grid - postpone until a Grid replacement is ready? (xref Implement Sample Sheets  #19305 (comment))
• "what would be the best way to hand over sample sheets to external sites that want to run our workflows ? will this work for workflow landing requests"

[mvdbeek]

For 25.1 Ideally

I would say filling a sheet with existing datasets is probably a very common operation we should support ? #20709

[jmchilton]

I missed that issue - sorry. Umm... I would say that everything you'd want to do or have available when creating a list should be available when creating a sample sheet (ditto for paired lists and paired sample sheets, etc..) so my recommendation would be to create the plain collection first and then use that option. I guess that workaround doesn't work for the "from tool form only" version of this though 🤔, I didn't think through that.

We could probably string the components together though in the wizard but they are pretty complex already and I'd be anxious to add that while we still haven't had any usage of the feature. Feels premature in that respect even though I will happily concede it will likely be a fairly common operation if these things gets used.