Update .gitignore to exclude virtual environment directories and enha…

…nce documentation on adding datasets with h5py (#2032)

* Update .gitignore to exclude virtual environment directories and enhance documentation on adding datasets with h5py

* Fix session start time to include local timezone in NWBFile example

* Update documentation to demonstrate adding datasets using PyNWB instead of h5py

* Update plot_editing.py

---------

Co-authored-by: Ryan Ly <[email protected]>

.gitignore

@@ -38,6 +38,11 @@ docs/build/
 docs/source/pynwb.*.rst
 
 
+# Virtual Environment
+venv/
+env/
+ENV/
+
 # setuptools
 build/
 dist/

docs/gallery/advanced_io/plot_editing.py

@@ -162,3 +162,41 @@
         "synthetic_timeseries_renamed",
         "/analysis/synthetic_timeseries_renamed",
     )
+
+##############################################
+# Adding datasets to existing groups
+# ----------------------------------
+# You can add new datasets to existing groups using PyNWB by calling ``set_modified()``.
+# Here's an example of adding a genotype to a Subject:
+
+from pynwb import NWBFile, NWBHDF5IO
+from pynwb.file import Subject
+
+# First, let's create a file with a Subject that is missing the genotype, which is optional
+nwbfile = NWBFile(
+    session_description="example file with subject",
+    identifier="EXAMPLE_ID",
+    session_start_time=datetime.now(tzlocal()),
+    session_id="LONELYMTN",
+    subject=Subject(
+        subject_id="mouse001",
+        species="Mus musculus",
+        age="P30D",
+    )
+)
+
+with NWBHDF5IO("test_edit3.nwb", "w") as io:
+    io.write(nwbfile)
+
+# Now add the genotype using PyNWB and set_modified()
+with NWBHDF5IO("test_edit3.nwb", "a") as io:
+    nwbfile = io.read()
+    nwbfile.subject.genotype = "Sst-IRES-Cre"
+    nwbfile.subject.set_modified()  # Required to mark the container as modified
+    io.write(nwbfile)
+
+# Verify the dataset was added
+with NWBHDF5IO("test_edit3.nwb", "r") as io:
+    nwbfile = io.read()
+    print(f"Subject genotype: {nwbfile.subject.genotype}")
+    # Output: Subject genotype: Sst-IRES-Cre