Distinction between categorical and numerical traits in the Trait Definition File.

[feserm]

I'm currently facing the challenge of having numeric and categorical traits. I would like to distinguish between the two cases in the trait definition file and cannot find a clear solution.

As of now, I see Scale being used as the Unit. IMO this should be changed, as unit is more a property of the scale. For categorical traits e.g. the scale would describe valid values and not the unit.

The tripartition into method, trait and scale is also found in BrAPI, maybe the MIAPPE model for Scale could be extended to follow this data model? It would then be possible to store the Data Type alongside the Unit and Valid Values.

Variable ID	Variable Name	Variable Accession Number	Trait	Trait Accession Number	Method	Method Accession Number	Scale	Data Type	Unit	Valid Values	Scale Accession Number
CONVAR	Row-Type convarity		Row-Type convarity		Observation Scoring		convarity scoring	categorical		1:'convar distichon',2:'convar vulgare'
SPIKE_LENGTH	Spike length		Spike length		Observation Scoring		length	numerical	centimeter

[arendd]

@cpommier What do you think ? I see the point, but the questions is, isn't this just already possible with the current MIAPPE version? Maybe it is "enough" to just improve the documentation and the example of a "Trait Definition File" and by doing this also finally merge the "v1.1" branch into the "master"!?