Two scope decisions left over from #6: the OldSpikeImporters lineage, and who builds the Python NewStim

#6 ends with two items that are decisions rather than tasks. #8 did the parts that were not blocked on them and deliberately left these; this issue is so they are asked in one place instead of being re-derived by whoever picks up the next port.

What #8 settled, for context

• getstimscript — ported as vhlib.StimDecode.getstimscript. The three MATLAB definitions of that name are not in competition: only StimulusDecoding/getstimscript.m is a free function taking a directory name, while vhlab-toolbox-matlab/file/@dirstruct/getstimscript.m and this library's OldSpikeImporters/@cksdirstruct/getstimscript.m are class methods, GETSTIMSCRIPT(DS, THEDIR). NDI-matlab's two call sites both pass a char path, so path order never enters into it.
• get_intervals / set_intervals — ported onto MeasuredData and as dict/.mat-struct-tolerant module functions.
• Two rows of #6's Tier 2 table were wrong: getparameters is a NewStim method at its only call site, not an @autocluster/@windowdiscriminator method; and get_data's call site reaches a data-bearing subclass, not the @measureddata base-class bounds check.
• The top-level bridge's downstream_requirements now lists every NDI-matlab (18ff517) call into this library with its call site and status.

That leaves the two questions below. Both need a human call; neither should be answered by whoever happens to need the function next.

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Question 1 — does the OldSpikeImporters / vhintan_* lineage get ported at all?

There is already a standing decision against it, at the area level, in vhlib/vhlib_matlab_python_bridge.yaml:

SpikeDataExtraction (388 files) — not_applicable. "Acquisition and spike extraction are NDI's job on the Python side: reading these formats belongs in NDI-python readers, not in a translation of this folder. Revisit only if a specific rig's format has no NDI reader."

And three NDI-matlab call sites reach into exactly that area:

call site	function	what it reaches
+ndi/+setup/+conv/+vhlab/importMeasuredDataCells.m:61	get_data(cells{j},[t0 t1])	a data-bearing @measureddata subclass — @spikedata and the cks* classes
+ndi/+gui/gui.m:150	vhintan_importcells(ud.ds)	cksmultipleunit, cksmeasureddata, get_data_par, loaddata, vhintan_loadcell
+ndi/+gui/gui.m:154	vhintan_clusternameref(ud.ds,name,ref)	cluster_spikewaves_gui

So the area decision and the dependency list disagree, and one of them has to give. Roughly:

1. Hold the area decision. These three NDI-matlab entry points are conversion and GUI paths; NDI-python satisfies them with its own readers and its own UI rather than by translating this folder. get_data, vhintan_importcells and vhintan_clusternameref become not_applicable here, with the reason recorded, and NDI-python#134's siblings are told where to go instead.
2. Narrow it. Port only the read path needed to open cells that already exist in old experiment files — @spikedata/cksmultipleunit/cksmeasureddata/loaddata/vhintan_loadcell and get_data on top of them — and leave acquisition and clustering out. This is the option that makes importMeasuredDataCells portable.
3. Case by case, which in practice means the decision gets made three times by three people.

Worth knowing before choosing: vhintan_clusternameref is not a data function. It drives cluster_spikewaves_gui, an interactive spike-sorting GUI, and writes intan_st_*.txt / intan_ci_*.mat cluster files back into the recording directories. Porting it faithfully is a UI question, and NDI plausibly wants its own sorting UI rather than this one.

Concretely: is option 1 or option 2 right, and if 2, is importMeasuredDataCells the only motivating caller?

Question 2 — who builds the Python NewStim, and does vhlib depend on it?

getstimscript now loads stims.mat and hands back saveScript exactly as the .mat loader produces it, because there is no Python stimscript to turn it into. That boundary is where a whole cluster of this repository stops:

function	what it needs from NewStim
getstimscriptparameters	parameters off a stimscript
getstimscriptsync	stimscript + sync record
mti_from_stimtimes_txt	takes a stimscript as input
findtransitionsSGSBL	STOCHASTICGRIDSTIM / BLINKINGSTIM objects
check_stimtimes_txt_vs_stims_mat	walks the stimscript in stims.mat
stimscriptgraph	currently raises NotImplementedError for this reason
repairoverflow_stimtimes_txt	getDisplayOrder(saveScript); ported but incomplete without it

NDI-matlab's NewStimStims.m:37 — getparameters(get(ss,i)) — is on the same boundary, and it is the reason ndi.daq.metadatareader.NewStimStims cannot be finished in Python.

The home for this appears to exist already: VH-Lab/vhlab-NewStim-python, whose README scopes it to "interpret data structures and read data files created in vhlab-NewStim-matlab" — exactly what is wanted here — but at a8bdd55 it is still a skeleton (an empty src/vhlab_newstim/__init__.py and a test that asserts the import works).

So: is vhlab-NewStim-python the intended home, and should vhlib take a dependency on it once it can read a saveScript? The alternative — a minimal stimscript reader living here — would be quick for one or two functions and wrong for seven, and would duplicate whatever that repository eventually does. If it is the intended home, the seven entries above can say so (not_yet_ported, blocked on a named repository) instead of each saying "blocked on the NewStim object model".

A note on what a reader has to handle: MATLAB writes saveScript as an old-style @stimscript object, which scipy.io.loadmat surfaces as a MATLAB-object wrapper rather than a struct, and savemat cannot write one — so tests for that path need real stims.mat fixtures recorded from MATLAB, not synthesized ones. #8's tests stand a struct in for saveScript for exactly this reason, and they check the directory and error logic only.

Minor, related: a private loader

vhlib.StimDecode.getstimscript and repairoverflow_stimtimes_txt both read .mat files through vlt.file.dirstruct._load_mat_file — the right implementation (scipy for v5/v6/v7, h5py for v7.3), but private by its name. vltMissingFunctions.md now asks vhlab-toolbox-python for a public equivalent. Not blocking anything; recorded so it is not rediscovered twice more.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

https://claude.ai/code/session_016P5BgMWNXp1mGckW4WXk6q

Start with vhlib/vhlib_matlab_python_bridge.yaml and the three NDI-matlab call sites listed in the issue, then read the vhlab-NewStim-python README and its skeleton test. Decide whether OldSpikeImporters stays excluded or has a focused read path, and whether vhlib should depend on NewStim Python; done means recording those decisions and updating the affected statuses and destinations.