NEWS

variantstring 1.8.7

get_component_variants() no longer errors on valid strings that combine a phased heterozygous locus with a homozygous locus (e.g. pfcrt:72_73:C|S_V). The homozygous allele is now correctly carried across all phased components.
check_position_string() now validates every distinct input. Previously, when the input contained duplicates, an invalid string positioned after the duplicates could be skipped and wrongly pass validation.
check_variant_string() and check_position_string() now report the reason for failure in the error condition itself (via conditionMessage()), instead of printing it to the console and raising an empty error. This makes the reason available to calling code that catches the error.

drop_read_counts() and position_from_variant_string() now preserve the format of the input rather than re-normalising it. In particular, position ranges (e.g. 72-74) are kept compact rather than expanded to 72_73_74, and the concise amino-acid notation (e.g. CV) is preserved rather than rewritten as C_V. Genes are still returned in alphabetical order.

Substantial refactor of the internals for speed and to remove duplicated code, with no change to the documented behaviour of the affected functions. The largest gains are in drop_read_counts() and position_from_variant_string() (now pure string operations), with smaller gains across most other functions.
Removed the unused tidyr dependency.