The legacy validator errored on the absence of subject directories, so this was written for consistency with that.

I don't see the use-case for subject-less datasets. Calling a directory that contains opaque sourcedata/ and derivatives/ directories a BIDS dataset seems counter to the goal of BIDS, which is legible neuroimaging data. What's your goal?

With my OpenNeuro hat on, removing basic "are there any data?" checks, combined with mechanisms to shield data from validation, is just asking for turn into an arbitrary data hosting service. So this is just a note that, if this is demoted to a warning, we will need to promote it back to an error, and should probably go ahead and promote it just in case. cc @nellh

I don't see the use-case for subject-less datasets. Calling a directory that contains opaque sourcedata/ and derivatives/ directories a BIDS dataset seems counter to the goal of BIDS, which is legible neuroimaging data. What's your goal?

immediate, although not mandatory if we do add dedicated DatasetType:

• Add DatasetType="project" and rework existing "layout" example into a proper BIDS dataset #1861
  and inline with that -- it could be neuro*-related (BIDS is beyond MRI for a while already) dataset of stimuli/, or purely phenotype/ data and IMHO could still be quite legit without "neuroimaging" or per subject data. Also group level results in derivatives etc.

But also it is a matter of consistency: if there is such a rule it should be clearly described also in the specification, which I think is not the case ATM.

Indeed it might require openneuro specific configuration, but I thought you already have one anyways.

@arokem @barbarastrasser I see you gave thumbs ups on the initial post. Would either of you care to make a formal review?

For the record, I agree with the argument that this error is not reflected in the text, so we should either update the text or relax the warning. OpenNeuro will continue to make it an error.

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@barbarastrasser I see you gave thumbs ups on the initial post. Would either of you care to make a formal review?

Yes, this is great! This way we can remove the manual downgrade in the validator config :)