Bug: derive_vars_period() errors unexpectedly when dataset_ref has unused variables

[manciniedoardo]

What happened?

When dataset_ref contains variables that are then not mentioned within the new_vars call, derive_vars_period() errors with the unhelpful error message:

Error in `signal_duplicate_records()`:
! Dataset `dataset_add` contains duplicate records with respect to `STUDYID` and `USUBJID`
Run `get_duplicates_dataset()` to access the duplicate records

when really one would at least expect the error message to flag that this is occurring because every variable in dataset_ref must either be a key variable or be mentioned in new_vars. Alternatively the function should just ignore unused variables. See reproducible example for details.

Session Information

Not relevant

Reproducible Example

adsl <- tibble(STUDYID = "xyz", USUBJID = c("1", "2"))

# Add period variables to ADSL
period_ref <- tribble(
  ~USUBJID, ~APERIOD, ~APERSDT,     ~APEREDT,     ~APERSDTM,                ~APEREDTM,
  "1",             1, "2021-01-04", "2021-02-06", "2021-01-04 10:10:00", "2021-02-07 11:20:01", 
  "1",             2, "2021-02-07", "2021-03-07", "2021-02-07 11:20:02", "2021-03-07 10:10:00",
  "2",             1, "2021-02-02", "2021-03-02", "2021-02-02 12:20:01", "2021-03-03 13:10:01",
  "2",             2, "2021-03-03", "2021-04-01", "2021-03-03 13:10:02", "2021-04-01 10:10:00"
) %>%
  mutate(
    STUDYID = "xyz",
    APERIOD = as.integer(APERIOD),
    APERSDT = ymd(APERSDT),
    APERSDT = ymd(APEREDT),
    APERSDTM = ymd_hms(APERSDTM),
    APEREDTM = ymd_hms(APEREDTM),
  )

# This errors because we are not mentioning APERSDTM, APEREDTM anywhere
derive_vars_period(
  adsl,
  dataset_ref = period_ref,
  new_vars = exprs(APxxSDT = APERSDT, APxxEDT = APEREDT)
)

# This doesn't error because we are mentioning APERSDTM, APEREDTM
derive_vars_period(
  adsl,
  dataset_ref = period_ref,
  new_vars = exprs(APxxSDT = APERSDT, APxxEDT = APEREDT, APxxSDTM = APERSDTM, APxxEDTM = APEREDTM)
)

# This doesn't error because we are removing APERSDTM, APEREDTM from period_ref
derive_vars_period(
  adsl,
  dataset_ref = period_ref %>% select(-ends_with("M")),
  new_vars = exprs(APxxSDT = APERSDT, APxxEDT = APEREDT)
)

[manciniedoardo]

Decision from core meeting: behaviour should be changed so that derive_vars_period doesn't throw an error at all, just ignores variables in period_ref that are not used in the function call