How do we determine what CellProfiler features are metadata or not?

[jenna-tomkinson]

How do we determine what CellProfiler features are metadata or not?

Hello! I am opening up this issue to start a conversation on how CytoTable should handle some columns we get as CellProfiler outputs.

Specifically, I noticed that in the most recent version of CytoTable at the time of this issue, I was seeing columns called "Nuclei_Parent," "Nuclei_Child," and "Nuclei_Number" that were being included as features after rerunning.

From my perspective, this column should not be treated as features; they are mainly important for merging single cells.

There are other features like center x,y coordinates that are included as features and have to be manually updated as metadata. There is a lot of nuance to this and likely a good internal conversation to have and make some main decisions:

1. Should CytoTable be the filter for what is considered features or metadata?
2. What columns do we determine are metadata or features?
3. Dicated by the above, should we set these decisions as standards or optional parameters?

[d33bs]

Relates to cytomining/pycytominer#510