arbitrary class to Instrument.add_parameter

[alexcjohnson]

@damazter as discussed, in case you want your own parameter class for Alazar or other complicated instruments.

[damazter]

This will definitely work for me, but it might be easier if it were (also) possible to just add an instance of a parameter. Then the parameters can be initialized without the need of using **kwargs in the code which leads to easier code in my opinion. Secondly, it would then be possible to add the same (instance of a) parameter to multiple instruments (although I am not convinced that we need this, but it could have some uses I think)

[alexcjohnson]

Then the parameters can be initialized without the need of using **kwargs in the code which leads to easier code in my opinion.

What do you mean, easier to read, or to write? I think parameters are complicated enough that we should always be constructing them using keyword arguments anyway, and if you do that then this form seems like it pretty easily maps onto whatever class you want to instantiate.

it might be easier if it were (also) possible to just add an instance of a parameter

Perhaps, but I've been trying to mostly duck type, rather than relying on isinstance(obj, Parameter), so in principle you can make your own parameters that don't even inherit from Parameter... but this would be complicated to check here. You can always just add your parameter directly to the dictionary:

param_obj = MyParameter(...)
self.parameters[param_obj.name] = param_obj

the only thing you miss then is the uniqueness check (that you're not overwriting an existing parameter)

[damazter]

Ok, that would indeed be a way out for the special cases.
I don't particularly like the **kwargs, because it is harder to infer which arguments to supply, but that is a minor nuisance.
Adding the arbitrary parameter class will however solve my problems in writing the Alazar data acquisition driver, so let's 💃