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Check for duplicate process/workflow calls in strict syntax #6324

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@bentsherman bentsherman commented Aug 2, 2025 •
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This PR adds the check for duplicate process/workflow calls to the strict syntax.

Currently the check is performed at runtime:

nextflow/modules/nextflow/src/main/groovy/nextflow/script/BindableDef.groovy

Lines 43 to 47 in 6f6a4cd

if( this instanceof ProcessDef && !invocations.add(fqName) ) {
log.debug "Bindable invocations=$invocations"
final msg = "Process '$name' has been already used -- If you need to reuse the same component, include it with a different name or include it in a different workflow context"
throw new DuplicateProcessInvocation(msg)
}

With the strict syntax, we can now catch this error much earlier at compile-time.

It looks like the runtime check only applies to duplicate process calls. There is no equivalent check for duplicate workflow calls, but I believe there should be, since duplicate workflows would lead to processes with the same fully-qualified name.

@bentsherman bentsherman requested a review from pditommaso August 2, 2025 15:41
@bentsherman bentsherman requested a review from a team as a code owner August 2, 2025 15:41
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@bentsherman bentsherman added this to the 25.10 milestone Aug 21, 2025
@bentsherman bentsherman requested review from jorgee and removed request for pditommaso September 2, 2025 12:07
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jorgee commented Sep 4, 2025

I have seen it is just checking if the process has been visited before in the workflow. In cases where the process is called inside an if-else statement, it will produce an error and it should be valid.
The following workflow should be valid and it is getting an error (If I correctly tested it)

nextflow.enable.strict=true
params.a = 1
process hello {
                script:
                """
                echo hello
                """
}
workflow {
      if (params.a == 1){
                hello()
      }else{
                hello()
      }
}

When running with the PR:

$ NXF_SYNTAX_PARSER=v2 ./launch.sh run a.nf

 N E X T F L O W   ~  version 25.06.0-edge

Launching `a.nf` [thirsty_lalande] DSL2 - revision: bb1409e71b

Error a.nf:13:3: Process `hello` cannot be called more than once in the same workflow -- use an alias instead
│  13 | 		hello()
╰     |   ^^^^^^^


ERROR ~ Script compilation failed

With the latest edge is working

$ NXF_VER=25.07.0-edge NXF_SYNTAX_PARSER=v2 nextflow run a.nf

 N E X T F L O W   ~  version 25.07.0-edge

Launching `a.nf` [small_hoover] DSL2 - revision: bb1409e71b

executor >  local (1)
[29/7a91f4] hello | 1 of 1 ✔

@bentsherman bentsherman removed this from the 25.10 milestone Sep 4, 2025
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Good catch. I would need to implement some live-variable analysis to do this properly in static analysis. Not worth doing right now. Thanks for testing

@bentsherman bentsherman closed this Sep 4, 2025
@bentsherman bentsherman deleted the check-duplicate-process-workflow-calls branch September 4, 2025 18:46
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