[Feature]: Change implementation of containers types to simplify API

[ehennestad]

What would you like to see added to MatNWB?

Many NWB types are containers for other types, with two examples being ProcessingModule and Fluorescence.

The syntax for setting/getting data for these containers is cumbersome:

ophys_module = types.core.ProcessingModule('description', 'contains optical physiology data')

ophys_module.nwbdatainterface.set('ImageSegmentation', img_seg);

and

fluorescence = types.core.Fluorescence();

fluorescence.roiresponseseries.set('RoiResponseSeries', roi_response_series);
ophys_module.nwbdatainterface.set('Fluorescence', fluorescence);

A simpler way of doing this would be:

ophys_module = types.core.ProcessingModule('description', 'contains optical physiology data')

ophys_module('ImageSegmentation') = img_seg;

and

fluorescence = types.core.Fluorescence();

fluorescence('RoiResponseSeries') = roi_response_series;
ophys_module('Fluorescence') = fluorescence;

A similar suggestion was raised in pynwb (issue #1993) and it would be great to mirror this on the matnwb side.

Is your feature request related to a problem?

No response

What solution would you like?

Redefine container classes to have dictionary/Set like behavior, while also restricting the types it is allowed to hold

Do you have any interest in helping implement the feature?

Yes.

Code of Conduct

• I agree to follow this project's Code of Conduct
• Have you ensured this change was not already requested?

[bendichter]

@ehennestad this sounds like a nice change, as long as we maintain backwards compatibility and have good tests for both the old and the new mode. But note that this only works when a container has a single Set object, so we'll need to check for that and revert to only supporting the old style if there are multiple.