Fig. 1

Keemei screenshots of a user validating a QIIME sample metadata mapping file. From the Google Sheets menu bar, the user selects Add-ons > Keemei > Validate QIIME mapping file to validate their spreadsheet against the QIIME (quantitative insights into microbial ecology) sample metadata mapping file format specification. Validation results are displayed directly in the spreadsheet and in a sidebar interface on the right side of the spreadsheet. Invalid cells are highlighted in the spreadsheet, where a red background color indicates the cell has one or more errors or warnings associated with it, and a yellow background color indicates the cell has one or more warnings associated with it. Hovering the mouse over a cell will display the reason(s) why the cell is invalid. The sidebar contains a summary of the validation (e.g. file format validated against, number of invalid cells, etc.) and lists invalid cells. The user can click on a cell in the sidebar to view the reason(s) why the cell is invalid (similar to hovering over a cell in the spreadsheet). In this screenshot, the user has clicked on invalid cell A3; we see that cells A3 and A5 contain duplicate sample identifiers, which are disallowed in QIIME mapping files. The data in this screenshot are derived from [13]