Change Deme.id to Deme.name

[jeromekelleher]

I think we should change the current id attribute on Deme to name. There's two main reasons for this:

1. Using id is intrusive for downstream implementations as they will already have some concept of a population/deme ID, and it's unlikely to match up with what we're requiring here. For example, msprime/tskit have zero-indexed integers as population IDs, and SLiM has one-indexed integers as population IDs. Neither can map the concept of "Deme id" directly into their data models, requiring icky workarounds where we add a "name" which corresponds to the Demes ID. This is both messy and will confuse users.
2. It's not as descriptive. "ID" has connotations of some unique, opaque identifier for a thing. We don't want people to give demes IDs, we want people to name then, in meaningful, memorable ways. Calling it a name gets this idea across much better.

Thoughts/objections?

[grahamgower]

Unfortunately, I think you're right. name would fit in better in a lot of ways.

[grahamgower]

This seemingly simple change will likely need lots of changes for related variable names and docs.

[jeromekelleher]

Yes, sorry. This will only get worse over time though - who wants to rip off the bandaid? I'll do the spec repo if you do demes-python?

[grahamgower]

Yes, sorry. This will only get worse over time though - who wants to rip off the bandaid? I'll do the spec repo if you do demes-python?

Deal!

[jeromekelleher]

OK - @molpopgen, @apragsdale any objections?

[molpopgen]

Makes sense to me.

[apragsdale]

No objections here.

…

On 19 Mar 2021, at 7:23, Kevin R. Thornton ***@***.***> wrote:  Makes sense to me. — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or unsubscribe.

[jeromekelleher]

OK, I'll sort this out here when I get a chance.