"Required" parameters on galaxy frontend

[andriineronov]

I made a galaxy tool for the synchrotron-inverse Compton project, and there there is a possibility to either define the electron spectrum with a formula, or input it as a file. In Galaxy, it thinks that the "input as a file" is a "required" parameter, but it should be "either-or"

[dsavchenko]

It's not expressed in annotations that this parameter is optional. In fact, your default value contradicts annotation.

There is oda:optional term to designate optional parameters, in this case the value "not set" should be None.

We don't support optional parameters in galaxy tools yet (files or not), but I imagine it's not a complicated change.

In MMODA, we also lack support of optional parameters on the frontend level.
Somehow file inputs are intrinsically optional (but I'm not sure, I let @burnout87 comment on this). If so, that could be misleading depending on the default value of the parameter (what if it refers to local file by default but user sets nothing in frontend? Will default value be used? That's completely wrong if true.).

[burnout87]

In MMODA, we also lack support of optional parameters on the frontend level. Somehow file inputs are intrinsically optional (but I'm not sure, I let @burnout87 comment on this). If so, that could be misleading depending on the default value of the parameter (what if it refers to local file by default but user sets nothing in frontend? Will default value be used? That's completely wrong if true.).

On the frontend side, they are optional, in the sense that no default file is selected. But, in theory, in the notebook, it can refer to a file locally available, we cannot exclude it. So, in that case, the local file will be used in the execution. It would be interesting to test this case, I will and will let you know.