aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate module

Validation utilities for canonical ephys xarray objects.

aind_ephys_utils expects a small set of canonical DataArray “kinds” (ragged spikes, binned spikes, continuous signals, events). This module provides helpers to infer and validate those conventions.

exception aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.EphysValidationError

Bases: ValueError

Raised when an object does not conform to ephysexplorer conventions.

class aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.ValidationResult(ok: bool, kind: str, message: str = '')

Bases: object

Structured result returned by validate.

ok

True if validation succeeded.

Type:

bool

kind

Inferred kind (e.g. “spikes_ragged”, “binned”, “continuous”, “events”).

Type:

str

message

Human-readable status string.

Type:

str

kind: str
message: str = ''
ok: bool
aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.infer_kind(da: DataArray) → str

Infer the canonical kind of a DataArray.

Parameters:

da – DataArray to classify.

Returns:

One of: “spikes_ragged”, “binned”, “continuous”, “events”, or “unknown”.

Return type:

str

aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.is_binned_spikes(da: DataArray) → bool
Binned spikes convention:

  • numeric

  • dims include (trial, unit, time)

aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.is_continuous(da: DataArray) → bool
Continuous convention:

  • has a numeric dtype (int/float/complex)

  • has a time dimension

  • often has trial plus one of unit/channel/feature/etc.

aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.is_events(da: DataArray) → bool
Events convention:

  • dims are (trial, event, bound)

  • dtype is numeric

  • bound coordinate has [“start”, “end”]

  • each event has start/end times (instantaneous events have start==end)

aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.is_ragged_spikes(da: DataArray) → bool
Ragged spikes convention:

  • dims include (trial, unit)

  • dtype is object

  • each element is a 1D array-like of spike times (seconds)

aind_ephys_utils.standards.validate.validate(da: DataArray, *, kind: str | None = None, require_time_coord: bool = True, check_ragged_contents: bool = True) → ValidationResult

Validate that a DataArray conforms to the conventions expected by .ephys.

Parameters:

  • da – The DataArray to validate.

  • kind – If provided, require that the DataArray matches this inferred kind. One of: “spikes_ragged”, “continuous”, “binned”, “events”.

  • require_time_coord – If True, require a ‘time’ coordinate whenever there is a time dimension.

  • check_ragged_contents – If True, sample-check ragged spike contents for basic shape/dtype sanity.

Return type:

ValidationResult