754f5637634694624fd359811c60513966f3c1a9
braney
  Sat Sep 5 07:58:46 2026 -0700
cartTrackVarCatalog: read a filename as a filename, not as a cart variable.

The harvester looks for a track-scoped name built as safef(buf, size,
"%s.%s", track, SUFFIX).  Code that builds "%s.tmp" from a filename has
exactly that shape, so every such site arrived as a name a person had to
write down in cartVarsNotCataloged.txt as not-a-cart-variable.  There were
15 of them, and they were arriving at a rate of one every few weeks: .tmp
came in on 2026-08-27 with writeMergedHubFile, _ss.ps on 2026-09-04 with
the RNA fold fix.  The docstring predicted the class from the start and
still asked for it to be thrown away by hand.

harvestCartVars.py now answers the question with fileNameLike(), which
asks whether the name's trailing dot-separated component is a file
extension.  FILE_SUFFIXES holds only the extensions the tree builds today
plus tbi beside bai: each entry is a name nobody classifies again, so a
guessed one adds a way to lose a real cart variable and buys nothing.

Two cleverer tests were tried and rejected, and the reasons are in the
docstring: the destination buffer's declaration does not decide it, since
the .bai and .link.bb sites format into a plain buf and buffer while
psName and tmpName are char[PATH_LEN]; and neither does the argument being
formatted, which is a filename at some sites, a url at others and a table
name at a third set.

The records still carry these names, because a harvest that hides what it
saw cannot be checked.  What changed is that --reconcile no longer asks a
person about them, and --update-baseline no longer writes them back.  They
are listed under --reconcile --verbose, and harvestCartVars.py --filenames
prints the rule's claims with their call sites.

Two things guard against the rule going wrong in the direction that would
matter.  --reconcile tests cataloged() before the filename rule, so a name
the catalog describes can never be suppressed by it.  And --check now fails
if any cataloged name would be read as a filename, which is the case where
the two halves of this file disagree about what a name is; verified with a
planted row that it reports rather than passing.

Baseline 70 names to 55.

refs #37838

diff --git src/hg/utils/cartTrackVarCatalog/harvestCartVars.py src/hg/utils/cartTrackVarCatalog/harvestCartVars.py
index dac403f0309..04d964e0f8c 100755
--- src/hg/utils/cartTrackVarCatalog/harvestCartVars.py
+++ src/hg/utils/cartTrackVarCatalog/harvestCartVars.py
@@ -21,60 +21,100 @@
 Macro identifiers are resolved against every #define in the scanned trees plus
 inc/, lib/ and hg/inc/, chased up to five levels deep so that things like
 GRAY_LEVEL_SCORE_MIN -> SCORE_MIN -> "scoreMin" come out as strings.
 
 What it cannot resolve it reports rather than drops:
 
   {ident}    an identifier with no #define found, usually a local variable
              holding a name computed at run time
   EXPR:...   a computed expression, e.g. a ternary
 
 Those are signal, not noise.  They mark the places where the name is built at
 run time, which is exactly where the hierarchy nests one level deeper:
 filter.<field>, decorator.<name>.<var>, <track>.<species>.
 
 Output needs curation.  The scan cannot tell a cart variable from a table
-name, a filename suffix or an SQL fragment, so expect to throw away things
-like .bai, _gold and .tbi by hand.
+name or an SQL fragment, so expect to throw away things like _gold by hand.
+
+One class of that is recognised here rather than by hand: a filename.  Code
+that builds "%s.tmp" from a filename looks exactly like code that builds
+"%s.heightPer" from a track name, so every such site used to arrive as a name
+somebody had to write down as not-a-cart-variable, 15 of them at the last
+count and a new one every few weeks.  fileNameLike() below answers the
+question instead, by asking whether the trailing component is a file
+extension.  The records still carry the name, because a harvest that hides
+what it saw cannot be checked; it is the catalog's --reconcile that stops
+asking a person about them, and --filenames lists exactly what the rule
+claims.
 
 Usage:
     harvestCartVars.py --by-func            # grouped by function, for reading
     harvestCartVars.py --by-var             # grouped by variable, with sites
+    harvestCartVars.py --filenames          # what the filename rule claims
     harvestCartVars.py --json recs.json     # raw records
     harvestCartVars.py --dirs hg/hgc,hg/hgTables --by-func
 """
 
 import argparse
 import collections
 import json
 import os
 import re
 import sys
 
 # The tree to scan.  KENT_SRC lets a nightly run point at a pristine
 # checkout instead of somebody's working tree, where a stray .c file or a
 # half-finished edit would show up as a finding.
 ROOT = os.environ.get("KENT_SRC") or os.path.expanduser("~/kent/src")
 
 # Everything that draws or configures a track.  hgc and hgTables are in the
 # default list because they read and write per-track vars too, which is easy
 # to forget.
 DEFAULT_DIRS = "hg/lib,hg/hgTracks,hg/hgTrackUi,hg/cgilib,hg/hgc,hg/hgTables"
 
 # Extra trees mined for #define values only, not scanned for call sites.
 MACRO_DIRS = ["inc", "lib", "hg/inc"]
 
+# File extensions that mark a harvested name as a filename rather than a cart
+# variable.  Deliberately only the ones the tree builds today, plus tbi beside
+# bai: every entry here is a name nobody has to classify again, so a guess adds
+# a way to lose a real cart variable silently and buys nothing.  Adding one is
+# a decision, and --filenames is how to check what it costs.
+FILE_SUFFIXES = frozenset([
+    "bai", "bb", "cgm", "eps", "err", "html", "ids", "log", "pdf", "png",
+    "ps", "tbi", "tmp", "txt", "wig",
+])
+
+
+def fileNameLike(var):
+    """Is this harvested name the tail of a filename rather than a cart name?
+
+    The test is on the trailing dot-separated component, after the leading
+    separator the harvester may or may not have captured, so ".tmp",
+    "_ss.ps" and ".link.bb" all answer yes through the same rule.
+
+    Two cleverer tests were tried and rejected.  The destination buffer's
+    declaration does not decide it: psName and tmpName are char[PATH_LEN] but
+    the .bai and .link.bb sites format into a plain buf and buffer.  Nor does
+    the argument being formatted: it is a filename at some sites, a url at
+    others and a table name at a third set, with no shared spelling.  The
+    extension is the only part that is actually about the name, which is what
+    this rule asks about, and it is the only part a reader can check.
+    """
+    name = var.lstrip("._")
+    return name.rsplit(".", 1)[-1].lower() in FILE_SUFFIXES
+
 
 # ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 # macro table
 # ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
 def build_macros(dirs):
     """(name -> literal, names defined inconsistently) over the scanned dirs.
 
     The second return value exists because a pooled table gives a name that two
     files define differently whichever value the directory listing reached
     first, so the answer changes between two checkouts of the same commit.
     Those names resolve to {NAME} unless the file being scanned defines them
     itself, the same call the per-file char * constants make.
     """
     macro = {}
@@ -376,59 +416,73 @@
 # main
 # ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
 def main():
     ap = argparse.ArgumentParser(
         description=__doc__,
         formatter_class=argparse.RawDescriptionHelpFormatter)
     ap.add_argument("--dirs", default=DEFAULT_DIRS,
                     help="comma-separated dirs under the kent src root to "
                          "scan (default: %s)" % DEFAULT_DIRS)
     ap.add_argument("--json", metavar="FILE", help="write raw records as JSON")
     ap.add_argument("--by-func", action="store_true",
                     help="group by file and function")
     ap.add_argument("--by-var", action="store_true",
                     help="group by variable, listing where each is used")
+    ap.add_argument("--filenames", action="store_true",
+                    help="list the harvested names the filename rule claims, "
+                         "with the call site, so the rule can be audited")
     ap.add_argument("--keep-unresolved", action="store_true",
                     help="include {ident} and EXPR: entries in the groupings")
     args = ap.parse_args()
 
     dirs = [d.strip() for d in args.dirs.split(",") if d.strip()]
     records = harvest(dirs)
 
     def wanted(var):
         if args.keep_unresolved:
             return True
         return not var.startswith("EXPR:") and "{" not in var
 
     if args.json:
         with open(args.json, "w") as f:
             json.dump(records, f, indent=1)
         print("wrote %s" % args.json, file=sys.stderr)
 
+    if args.filenames:
+        hits = {}
+        for r in sorted(records, key=lambda r: (r["file"], r["line"])):
+            if wanted(r["var"]) and fileNameLike(r["var"]):
+                hits.setdefault(r["var"].lstrip("._"),
+                                "%s:%d" % (r["file"], r["line"]))
+        print("%d harvested names read as filenames, not cart variables"
+              % len(hits))
+        for n in sorted(hits):
+            print("    %-16s %s" % (n, hits[n]))
+
     if args.by_func:
         byfunc = collections.defaultdict(set)
         for r in records:
             if wanted(r["var"]):
                 byfunc[(r["file"], r["func"])].add(r["var"])
         for k in sorted(byfunc):
             print("%s  %s()" % (k[0], k[1]))
             print("    " + ", ".join(sorted(byfunc[k])))
 
     if args.by_var:
         byvar = collections.defaultdict(set)
         for r in records:
             if wanted(r["var"]):
                 byvar[r["var"]].add("%s:%d" % (r["file"], r["line"]))
         for k in sorted(byvar, key=str.lower):
             print("%-34s %d  %s"
                   % (k, len(byvar[k]), " ".join(sorted(byvar[k])[:4])))
 
-    if not (args.json or args.by_func or args.by_var):
-        print("nothing to do; pass --by-func, --by-var or --json",
+    if not (args.json or args.by_func or args.by_var or args.filenames):
+        print("nothing to do; pass --by-func, --by-var, --filenames or --json",
               file=sys.stderr)
         return 1
     return 0
 
 
 if __name__ == "__main__":
     sys.exit(main())