Improve error message if adding neurodata types of the wrong types as…

… property values (#638)

* Add utility methods for checking if an object / classname represents a neurodata type

* Fix bug and improve error for invalid neurodata types in types.util.checkDType

* Update isNeurodataTypeClassName.m

Fix missing arg

* Try running tests with pynwb pre-release (dev)

* Add new error id to whitelist

* Update run_tests.yml

* Update requirements to use dev from pynwb and nwbinspector

* Change error id in types.util.checkDType

* Fix errorID in linkTest

* Add test for new utility function

* Fix +matnwb/+utility/isNeurodataTypeClassName.m

Make check more robust

+matnwb/+utility/isNeurodataType.m

@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+function tf = isNeurodataType(value)
+% isNeurodataType - Check if a value / object is a neurodata type.
+%
+%   tf = matnwb.utility.isNeurodataType(value) returns true if the value
+%       is an object of a class representing a neurodata type of the NWB Format.
+%       If the input is a string representing the class name of a neurodata
+%       type, the function will also return true.
+
+    tf = false;
+    if isa(value, 'char') || isa(value, 'string')
+        tf = matnwb.utility.isNeurodataTypeClassName(value);
+    elseif isa(value, 'types.untyped.MetaClass')
+        className = class(value);
+        tf = matnwb.utility.isNeurodataTypeClassName(className);
+    end
+end

+matnwb/+utility/isNeurodataTypeClassName.m

@@ -0,0 +1,58 @@
+function tf = isNeurodataTypeClassName(typeName)
+% isNeurodataTypeClassName - Check if a name is the class name of a neurodata type.
+%
+%   tf = matnwb.utility.isNeurodataTypeClassName(value) returns true if a 
+%       string is the class name of a class representing a neurodata type of 
+%       the NWB Format
+
+    arguments
+        typeName (1,1) string
+    end
+
+    tf = false;
+    if startsWith(typeName, 'types.') && ~startsWith(typeName, 'types.untyped')
+        mc = meta.class.fromName(typeName);
+        if ~isempty(mc)
+            tf = hasSuperClass(mc, 'types.untyped.MetaClass');
+        end
+    end
+end
+
+function tf = hasSuperClass(mc, superClassName)
+% hasSuperClass - Recursively check if a meta.class object has a specific superclass.
+%
+%   tf = hasSuperClass(mc, superClassName) returns true if the meta.class object
+%       mc has a superclass with the name superClassName, either directly or
+%       indirectly (through its own superclasses).
+%
+%   Arguments:
+%       mc - A meta.class object.
+%       superClassName - The name of the superclass to check for (string).
+%
+%   Returns:
+%       tf - Logical value indicating if the class has the specified superclass.
+
+    arguments
+        mc meta.class
+        superClassName (1,1) string
+    end
+
+    % Check if the current class has the desired superclass directly.
+    for i = 1:numel(mc.SuperclassList)
+        if mc.SuperclassList(i).Name == superClassName
+            tf = true;
+            return;
+        end
+    end
+
+    % If not, check recursively through each superclass.
+    for i = 1:numel(mc.SuperclassList)
+        if hasSuperClass(mc.SuperclassList(i), superClassName)
+            tf = true;
+            return;
+        end
+    end
+
+    % If no match found, return false.
+    tf = false;
+end

+tests/+unit/FunctionTests.m

@@ -34,5 +34,12 @@ function testWriteCompoundScalar(testCase)
             io.writeCompound(fid, '/map_data', data)
             H5F.close(fid);
         end
+        function testIsNeurodatatype(testCase)
+            timeSeries = types.core.TimeSeries();
+            testCase.verifyTrue(matnwb.utility.isNeurodataType(timeSeries))
+
+            dataPipe = types.untyped.DataPipe('data', rand(10,10));
+            testCase.verifyFalse(matnwb.utility.isNeurodataType(dataPipe))
+        end
     end 
 end

+tests/+unit/linkTest.m

@@ -100,13 +100,13 @@ function testDirectTypeAssignmentToSoftLinkProperty(testCase)
 end
 
 function testWrongTypeInSoftLinkAssignment(testCase)
-
+    % Adding an OpticalChannel as device for ElectrodeGroup should fail.
     function createElectrodeGroupWithWrongDeviceType()
         not_a_device = types.core.OpticalChannel('description', 'test_channel');
         electrodeGroup = types.core.ElectrodeGroup(...
             'description', 'test_group', ...
             'device', not_a_device); %#ok<NASGU>
     end
     testCase.verifyError(@createElectrodeGroupWithWrongDeviceType, ...
-        'NWB:TypeCorrection:InvalidConversion')
+        'NWB:CheckDType:InvalidNeurodataType')
 end

+tests/requirements.txt

@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
 hdf5plugin
 git+https://github.com/NeurodataWithoutBorders/nwbinspector.git@dev
-git+https://github.com/NeurodataWithoutBorders/pynwb.git@dev
+git+https://github.com/NeurodataWithoutBorders/pynwb.git@dev

+types/+util/checkConstraint.m

@@ -18,6 +18,7 @@ function checkConstraint(pname, name, namedprops, constrained, val)
             expectedErrorTypes = {...
                 'NWB:CheckDType:InvalidType', ...
                 'NWB:CheckDType:InvalidShape', ...
+                'NWB:CheckDType:InvalidNeurodataType', ...
                 'NWB:TypeCorrection:InvalidConversion'};
             if ~any(strcmp(ME.identifier, expectedErrorTypes))
                 rethrow(ME);

+types/+util/checkDtype.m

@@ -57,11 +57,12 @@
             'Number of elements for each struct field must match to be valid.'], ...
             num2str(fieldSizes));
     end
-
+
+    parentName = name;
     for iField = 1:length(expectedFields)
         % validate subfield types.
         name = expectedFields{iField};
-        subName = [name '.' name];
+        subName = [parentName '.' name];
         subType = typeDescriptor.(name);
 
         if (isstruct(value) && isscalar(value)) || istable(value)
@@ -123,7 +124,15 @@
     value = unwrapValue(value);
 end
 
-correctedValue = types.util.correctType(value, typeDescriptor);
+if matnwb.utility.isNeurodataType(typeDescriptor)
+    errorId = 'NWB:CheckDType:InvalidNeurodataType';
+    errorMessage = sprintf(['Expected value for `%s` to be of ', ...
+        'type `%s`. Instead it was `%s`'], name, typeDescriptor, class(value));
+    assert(isa(value, typeDescriptor), errorId, errorMessage)
+    correctedValue = value;
+else
+    correctedValue = types.util.correctType(value, typeDescriptor);
+end
 % this specific conversion is fine as HDF5 doesn't have a representative
 % datetime type. Thus we suppress the warning for this case.
 isDatetimeConversion = isa(correctedValue, 'datetime')...